I'm in Trouble!

I got yelled at when I presented dinner today. "Chicken Parm?! Don't you know that's like one of four things I can make?! It's my dish!" Okay then. Next time I won't cook dinner. Also, you need to expand your repertoire. This dish was a good excuse to use up the last bit of my spicy hot tomato sauce. It came out pretty good!

Spicy Chicken Parmesan!

(created in my kitchen!)

Ingredients:
2 chicken breasts, halved and pounded thin
1/2 cup flour
salt, pepper, garlic
1 egg
1 tablespoon water
1/2 cup panko
1/4 cup parmesan
1-2 tablespoons olive oil
1-2 cups tomato sauce (I used my spicy sauce!)
Mozzarella cheese, sliced
Directions: 
1. Heat up olive oil in large frying pan. In the meantime mix the flour, salt, pepper, and garlic in one bowl. In the second bowl mix the egg and water. In the third bowl mix the panko and parmesan.
2. Take each piece of chicken and coat it in flour, dip it in the egg mixture and then dredge it with the panko. Place in a hot frying pan and brown, a few minutes on each side (depends on thickness)
3. Place in an oven safe dish, cover with sauce and top with mozzarella slices. Bake at 350 degrees for 20-30 minutes or until done (depends on thickness)

To balance the meal out we had a salad with leftover mozzarella and cranberries. Yum!

Mozzarella Toasts!

I've been horribly uninspired and lazy in the kitchen this week. But last month I made mozzarella toasts with left over bread and cheese! I used some of my fresh Wegman's basil (The Lawyer suggested naming the plant Baaasil but I think I'm just going to start calling it Weggy for Wegmans) and I made a balsamic reduction to top it all off. I brought this to lunch for at least half of summer camp, yay variety. Plus I had so much basil I didn't know what to do with it.

Mozzarella Toasts

(Just winging it)

Ingredients:
Toasted Bread
Mozzarella
Fresh Basil
Balsamic Vinegar
Optional: Sugar for a sweeter reduction
Directions:
1. Toast your bread, slice your cheese and chop up your basil. (Or toast your bread and cheese together for gooey cheese)
2. Heat up your balsamic on medium heat and reduce till syrupy and it coats a spoon (but don't burn your tongue taste testing like I did). If you want a sweeter reduction add in sugar to taste.
3. Be artsy and drizzle your reduction over your toasts.

Margherita Pizza

Around lunch time I realized that we did not have any dinner plans so I hastily whipped out a Food Network Magazine "50" insert. These amazing inserts come in every issue and have a different theme each month. I went for the 50 pizzas but previous themes have been pancakes/waffles, eggs, nachos, holiday drinks, panini, burgers, etc. The idea is they give you the basic recipe, for example in 50 pizza it's the pizza dough, and then 50 different ways and combinations to make the dish. The outcome was sufficient. It was fine but did not have any special flavor pop, we added some garlic and red pepper flakes after the fact. This was influence by the fact that I only had a fresh tomato to use and didn't used canned ones. It was good in a pinch but I would keep looking for a more flavorful Margherita Pizza recipe (in fact there's a yummy looking one from Tyler Florence I just found).

Margherita Pizza

(Food Network Magazine)

Ingredients:

3 3/4 cups flour

1.5 teaspoons salt

1 1/3 cups warm water

1 tablespoon sugar

3 tablespoons olive oil

1/2 cup crushed tomatoes

1/2 pound diced mozzarella

Fresh Basil Leaves

Oregano, Salt, Pepper to taste

Pizza Dough Directions:
Whisk 3 3/4 cups flour and 1 1/2 teaspoons salt. Make a well and add 1 1/3 cups warm water, 1 tablespoon sugar and 1 packet yeast. When foamy, mix in 3 tablespoons olive oil; knead until smooth, 5 minutes. Brush with olive oil, cover in a bowl and let rise until doubled, about 1 hour 30 minutes. Divide into two 1-pound balls. Use 1 pound per recipe unless noted.

Directions for toppings:
Stretch dough into two thin 9-inch rounds. Top each with 1/2 cup crushed San Marzano tomatoes, dried oregano, salt, pepper and olive oil; bake until golden. Sprinkle with 1/2 pound diced mozzarella, torn basil and salt. Bake until the cheese melts, then drizzle with olive oil.

How to make a pizza:
Step 1: Place a pizza stone or an inverted baking sheet on the lowest oven rack and preheat to 500 degrees.
Step 2: Stretch 1 pound dough on a floured pizza peel, large wooden cutting board or parchment paper.
Step 3: Top as desired, then slide the pizza (with the parchment paper, if using) onto the stone or baking sheet. Bake until golden, about 15 minutes.

I also ran out of flour and had to cut the dough recipe, it took forever to rise, I didn't have a stone or parchment paper, and the lack of flour made the sticky dough a pain to roll out. But it came out okay and we're not starving. Mission accomplished.