dutch oven

Creamy Chicken and Dumplings

25 Mar 2013

4 Comments

Going into my second spring of eating clean, I am much more confident in my cooking. I have learned a lot of basic cooking techniques, you know, cooking the way you should! I did shy away from some of my favorite comfort foods. I was intimidated by making them clean. Boy, am I silly. Creamy Chicken and Dumplings is just one of those recipes I cannot live without. So, here’s how I broke it down…

Chicken and Dumplings - The Pomegranate Chronicles

Creamy Chicken and Dumplings
1 lb organic chicken breast (cubed)
2 Tbs butter
1 ¾ cup chicken broth (fresh is the best)
1 cup whole milk
2 tsp fresh marjoram leaves (3/4 tsp dried)
½ tsp sea salt
1 bag mixed veggies (I prefer Cascadian Farms, but fresh would be even better! Approx. 18 oz or to taste)

Yogurt Drop Dumplings
2 cups all-purpose flour (plus more if needed)
1 tsp salt
3 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
5 Tbs butter
7/8 cup plain whole fat yogurt (I use homemade)

1. In Dutch oven (4 quart+) melt 2 Tbs butter, add chicken, and sauté over medium heat until chicken is golden brown.
2. Add broth and deglaze bottom of the pot.
3. Once broth is warm, add milk, marjoram, salt and frozen veggies.
4. Heat mixture until just boiling, and then reduce to bubble gently. (*If mixture is not as thick as you would like, pinch 1 Tbs of butter with 2 Tbs of flour, slowly whisk mixture into the broth and mix well)
5. Prepare dumplings. In a mixer add dry ingredients, cut in butter. Add yogurt and mix until it forms a ball.
6. Be sure bubbles are just breaking the surface of the chicken mixture, drop dumpling mix by spoon into 12 biscuits on top.
7. Cook uncovered for 10 mins, then covered for 10 mins.
8. Scoop out and enjoy!

Happy Cooking!

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Meatless Monday – Mac and Cheese Style Cauliflower

12 Nov 2012

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I recently repinned this amazing recipe for Mac and Cheese Style Cauliflower to my Feast on This! board on Pinterest. I have been wanting to try it for Meatless Monday. I have to say, it is very, very good!

I started by lightly steaming the cauliflower (it was better that they stayed firm).

Using my dutch oven for this dish, made it transfer from the stove top to oven easily for this simple recipe. Day old Whole Wheat 5 min Bread made for fantastic fresh breadcrumbs. Nutritional yeast is used in this recipe, making it a very hardy dish. Knowing the nutritional value of nutritional yeast, I was excited to finally have a recipe that uses it.

The whole family loved this dish. It has been added to our favorites!

Happy Meatless Monday!

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Barley Soup

6 Aug 2012

6 Comments

This was, by far, the best soup I have ever made. I think partly because I started with my own homemade broth.

Sidetracked: I just did a search on my blog to link to the recipe for my broth and realized that after 5 years of blogging, I have never told you how I make it. Well, that ends now! After making Rosemary Crockpot Chicken (I now add lemon and use fresh garlic), I put all the bones and unused meat (including skin) back in the crock. The more meat left, the better tasting your broth will be. I add enough water to almost fill the crock, a few more sprigs of rosemary, a bay leaf, any left over lemon juice, 3 gloves of crushed garlic, salt (about 2 tsps) and pepper (about 1/2 tsp) to the bones, skin and meat. Then I let it simmer on high until I go to bed, then I turn it down to low and let it cook overnight (some people don’t like doing this, but I’ve done it for years). By morning, remove the crock from the crockpot and let it cool a bit. Then separate the bones from the broth. Freeze or use fresh…it’s perfect, and the perfect starter to this awesome Barley Soup!

Barley Soup

8 Cups of Broth (I usually get about 7 from my crockpot and added one cup of regular water)
1 cup pearled barley
1 cup carrots (chopped)
1 cup celery (chopped)
1 cup onion (chopped)
1 cup parsnips (chopped)
salt and pepper to taste
1/4 cup fresh dill (chopped)
1/4 cup fresh chives (chopped)

1. Bring stock to a boil, add barley, carrots, onion and parsnips.
2. Turn heat down to simmer and cover partially.
3. Simmer until barley is soft, add salt and pepper to taste.
4.  Stir in dill and chives.
5. Enjoy!

Please let me know if you try this recipe. Do you have another way you prepare broth?

Cook More.

By: Category: Food Tags: , , , , ,

Campfire White Whole Wheat Bread

2 Jul 2012

4 Comments

Besides Okra Stew, I also took on the challenge to make homemade bread in the dutch oven on the campfire. I have seen some really great looking recipes online like this one from Mother Earth News. I was anxious to try it. We were camping, of course and I realized, while making my no-knead dough, I did not have all the right ingredients. Luckily, the most useful advice I have gotten from Chef Kevin is to just wing it. I had my doubts during the process, but at the end of the day, this hearty dense loaf of wonderfulness was the pleasantly surprising result.

White Whole Wheat Camping Bread
No-Knead Dough:
3 cups White Whole Wheat Flour
3 packets of active dry yeast
1 1/2 cups of luke warm water
1 1/2 teaspoons salt

Directions:
1. In the morning, combine yeast and salt in the look warm water mix until dissolved.
2. Add flour, this will be a sticky wet dough.
3. Cover and put in your tent to keep safe from natures creatures. Go enjoy your day!
4. Before dinner, oil your dutch oven.
5. Shape dough as much as possible and place in the dutch oven. Let rise another 45 mins. (you can add seeds to the top at this point if you would like, we had pumpkin seeds available) and prepare coals.
6.  Once coals are gray, place them in a circle on the ground. Set the dutch oven on top.
7. Cover and load the top with coals.
8. Let cook approx. 30 mins or until it starts to brown.
9. Take out of the dutch oven and let stand for 10 mins. before cutting.

Happy Camping!

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Campfire Okra Stew

28 Jun 2012

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This is the perfect dish to comfort your taste buds after a long day of hiking or biking. You can prepare a packet of spices ahead of time and bring frozen Okra in your cooler.

Adapted from Paleo Comfort Foods by Julie and Charles Mayfield, Okra Stew

Before your trip, combine the following ingredients in ziplock or jar:
1 teaspoon of fresh cracked pepper
1/2 teaspoon cumin
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon fresh oregano
1 teaspoon fresh thyme

Add to your cooler:
1 package frozen okra
2 cloves garlic

You can pre-cut:
1/2 red bell pepper
1 large onion

And pack:
28 oz whole canned tomatoes
1 tsp Better than Bullion (Veggie)
Olive oil or butter

If you don’t like okra, you can easily make this dish with zucchini, summer squash or pretty much any veggies. We had fresh okra available to us, but not enough, so I added zucchini to this batch.

Directions:
1. Prepare coals, once they are grey, set up 15 in a circle. Set dutch oven on the coals. Add two tablespoons of oil and onions. Stir until soft (you can place the cover on at this point, but don’t add coals to the top yet.
2. Add garlic, all veggies, tomatoes, spices, 1 cup of water and better than bullion. Stir well and cover.
3. Add coals to the top.

The more coals you add, the quicker it will cook. If you have more time, use less and let it simmer. Cook until all veggies are soft and enjoy!

This soup is full of fantastic flavors and is a very easy dutch oven recipe. We served it with a dutch oven White Whole Wheat bread. I will be posting that recipe soon too!

Happy Camping!

 


 

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Campfire Yum-bo

19 Jul 2011

5 Comments

Although our Campfire Cheesecake was AMAZING, I have to admit, this Gumbo dish was my favorite! So get your coals ready, here comes the BEST campfire dinner recipe I have ever had.

Campfire Yum-bo
By Chef Kevin

Ingredients:

1 large onion diced
4 stalks of celery diced
2 green peppers diced
2 links of chorizo sausage cut in half the long way and then sliced (half circles)
1 lb. small peeled and deveined shrimp
1 lb chicken meat diced
1 bag frozen slice okra (about 12 oz)
1 big can diced tomatoes in juice
For seasoning; salt pepper, gumbo file (not easy to find, we substituted cajun seasoning)

Directions: Brown up the veggies in the dutch oven (cover if needed for more heat, stirring often). Then add meats.

Finally add tomatoes, okra, seasoning and simmer with coals on top and bottom for about an hour (or until chicken is cooked), stirring when needed. You can also add rice at this point if you would like.

It may take longer depending on coals and how full you fill the dutch oven. Ours was a bit high, so we omitted rice and ate it more as a stew. We added rice to the left overs the next night and got two meals out of it. Did I mention how amazing this was? What also makes this a great dish is that all the prep can be done before you leave. You can cut everything up, place in ziplocks and put them in the cooler. This will take up less space and makes it easy to just dump the ingredients into the pot.

As if this amazing dish wasn’t enough, we had it with Bacon Gorgonzola Cornbread. Also made in the dutch oven. I’ll be posting that soon too. This can also be done on the stove if you would like to make it in your home dutch oven. Once we get through this heatwave, I think I will be trying it again.

Happy Camping!

 

By: Category: Food, The Pomegranate Chronicles Tags: , , ,

Campfire Cheesecake

Campfire Cheesecake

6 Jul 2011

11 Comments

Yep. You heard right, Cheesecake by the campfire! This was a fantastic dessert served in our dutch oven. Although, this recipe came from our extreme camp cooking friends, I did find the recipe here for Dutch Oven Cheesecake. The crust was made by crushing the graham crackers and adding sugar and butter. It is added to the pot and placed on top of the first set of coals.

Then the filling was started. It was all whipped together until fluffy.

Once the crust had baked a bit, the filling was added.

The top of the dutch oven was added with coals on top and cooked for about an hour (or maybe a little more). It was set aside to cool for a bit, then the cherry topping was added.

Really? Look at that!!! Does camping really get better than this?

It was served warm, which I was curious if I would like or not. Oh my gosh…it was FANTASTIC!

Ahhhh, campfire cheesecake, I’m in love!

Happy Camping!

By: Category: Food, The Pomegranate Chronicles Tags: , , , , ,

New England Pot Roast

22 Mar 2011

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This simple Pot Roast recipe is simply amazing! It transforms a simple pot roast into a mouth watering sweet horseradish masterpiece.

Simple, simple. Sear pot roast on all sides in your dutch oven. Add 1/2 cup of horse radish to the top of roast. Add 1/2 cup of water in the pot, but not over the beef. Let cook for 2-3 hours depending on weight. Add carrots, potatoes and onions. Let cook another 20 mins until veggies are cooked. In another container mix 2 tbs of flour and a bit of water. Take meat and veggies out of dutch oven. Add water/flour mix to pot to create horseradish gravy. DELISH!

Happy Cooking!

By: Category: Food, The Pomegranate Chronicles Tags: , ,

Happy St. Patty’s Day

17 Mar 2011

2 Comments

There use to be a time in my life when St. Patty’s Day meant wearing something green, going to the local pub and having a few too many green beers. These days, there is no green beer and my favorite part of St. Patty’s Day is the boiled dinner. My how life changes!

This is the second year I have made the perfect recipe. I love the colors that go into this dinner. The carrots, cabbage and red potatoes just look so fresh and appetizing.

The spices from the Corned Beef kit make the house smell amazing.

Many people don’t like cabbage. I think this recipe “gets” it by adding the cabbage only 10 mins before the meal is done. This helps it not to break down and get “stinky”. The cabbage remains somewhat crisp and keeps its sweet taste.

Yummy, another delicious St. Patty’s Day! Cheers!

By: Category: The Pomegranate Chronicles Tags: , , ,

Warm Up – French Onion Soup

25 Jan 2011

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We all know how cold it has been in the North East today. The air burned my lungs during a quick trip to the end of the driveway to retrieve the recycle bin. It’s just too cold. That’s when I made the decision that just because it’s cold outside, does not mean I need to be cold inside! So I made French Onion Soup. Here’s my recipe…

Ingredients:

2/3 stick of butter, 5 medium onions sliced thin, a carton of beef broth, thyme, parsley, salt and pepper, garlic cheddar croutons and shredded sharp cheddar cheese.

Melt butter in your dutch oven. Add the onions. Let them cook for 20-30 mins until brown.

Add beef broth, a pinch of thyme, a pinch of parsley and salt and pepper to taste. Bring to a boil, turn down and let simmer for 20 mins.

Scoop into the perfect soup bowl,  top with croutons and cheese. Pop in microwave for 1 min. (or oven in a heat proof crocks – I need to thrift some!)

Once the soup is ooey gooey, it’s done! Enjoy!

By: Category: Food, The Pomegranate Chronicles, Thrifting Tags: , , ,
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