cooking @ home

Archive for August, 2007

What is the difference between a parfait and a trifle? Well, first, this is actually a British trifle as they contain lady fingers, where as the American version, one thinks more of ice cream. Nowadays they are fairly interchangable words. That having been said though, one can still easily a web forum full of people arguing strongly as to which one it really was. Myself, I always like to go with the an alliteration when given the choice.

What is this then? It’s a multi-layered desert in a glass. Note: A trifle can be done directly in the glass, but is often done in a (you guessed it) trifle bowl, and then put into glasses. The idea as you see is two-fold. First, the repeated mention of glass is an easy clue that this is a desert to be as much relished by the eyes as it is by the tongue.

There is, I find (as I always seem to, being new to writing recipes though not to cooking) is giving accurate instructions when everything is different. This could be done in the trifle dish and then moved over to the glass. But even if done directly, not every glass container is the same. Not even remotely. Different volumes, different (internal) heights, different top widths and diameters. Sizes like Mut and Jeff, like Laurel and Hardy. Trying to figure out “exacting” directions. I’d say, near impossible. With that in mind, I’m tossing completely out the concept and going with rough and approximate guesstimates. (If you can live with that, you’re obviously a baker. Pass on to another recipe.)

Obviously since we’re using liqueur this is an “adult dessert”. But don’t fret, I’ve included the children’s version at the end.

I just quickly wanted to say what inspired me for this. Obviously I’d seen several parfait and trifle recipes recently. Then I looked around the house at my canned fruits, some peaches, apricots, pears and pineapple. Pear I though, what a wonderfully odd fruit. Compared to the others mentioned, not the first choice in a dessert as the others seem, somehow more robust in flavor.

At that point of course, now I just had to come up with something for the pears. Creme de cocoa maybe? Chocolate’s always a winner, but then I thought what it’s usually paired up with, raspberry, orange, and the rest. Again, strong flavors when compare to the pear. So I thought light, and up came Kahlua. Ok, pear and coffee, odd, but it should work. What else?

So then I began thinking of contrasting flavors but given how light this was heading, any contrasting would end up overpowering the rest of the flaovrs. Think complimentary tastes then. When I spied the bag of shaved almonds on my shelf, I was immediately sold. The flavor would lend itself naturally with the others, and yet the slight crunch would be a excellent contrast in textures. Yes, I thought, this is going to be a winner.

One thing, yes the tastes are light, but it is definitely a sweet desert. Try to avoid the natural tendency to really soak the fingers in the Kahlua. I’ve made this twice now, and the one where I had a “lighter touch” was better. In short, you can go overboard with the Kahlua quite easily.

Needlesstosay, something like this is great for getting children to have a “sundae” style desert containing no ice cream and still getting them to eat some delicious fruit.

Pear Parfait (Trifle)
©2007 Harry Kenney

ingredients:

Ladyfingers
Canned pears (though we won’t be using the syrup)
Kahlua liqueur
Whipped cream
Shaved almonds

How much of what varies too much upon shapes and sizes of dessert glass (and even more so if you’re using an actual trifle dish and then spooning it out after) — so wing it. As some sort of guide though, a dozen lady fingers and a 29 oz can of pears will serve about four. (Or, depending, maybe five, six tops.)

Roll ladyfingers on the side in a shallow plate or bowl of Khalua. You want to get the edges covered, not the insides, so you want the liquid to come up to only maybe 1/4 of the size of height of sideways ladyfinger. This means you leave a bit of crunch in the middle. Remember, not too long at all, in, roll, cover all sides, out. These are very much edible sponges.

Depending on your container, place the ladyfinger in the bottom. Smaller bowl or width, break in half. For a thinner, more vertical glass, break into three or four pieces. This is a layered dessert and it’s all going to be scrunched and destroyed with the spoon while eating, so don’t worry about this.

Add a couple shaved almonds and a small dollip of whipped cream in the middle here. Remember, small. (Also remember we’re doing this only on the bottom, and not to do this on the next layer.) Ok, next layer put in some pears. Break those in half or more with your tablespoon as needed to fit that glass.

Next layer, whipped cream. Now we do it all again the same way. Ladyfingers rolled in the Khaula, broken to fit (no dabs of whipped cream and almonds here, again, none). Top with a layer of cut pears. We should be near or at the top now, however much you’ve put in.

At the top, heavily cover with whipped cream. Take some of the Khalua remaining in the dish (pour more if needed) and put two or three tables spoons of it over and down the whipped cream. Sprinkle generously with shaved almonds. Voila.

Extra punch version: You could even go further with this by making the whipped cream yourself using heavy cream, a bit of powdered sugar, a dash of vanilla extrac, and toss in a few shots of Ameretta. More almondy and definitely more “punch”. And, as for a total 180, there’s the … Kid’s version: Substitute the Kahalua with chocolate syrup or perhaps caramel syrup. Leave or remove the almonds as you see fit. (Some kids love nuts and chocolate, some can’t stand nuts.) The almonds can certainly be replaced with anything from raisins, to minced marachino cherries, to little chunks of fresh banana. Be creative.

I personally enjoy white wines over reds. Some say I must not have a cultured palette therefore. I tell them take a long walk off a short pier. I like what I like. You like what you like. Neither of us is wrong. It’s called a preference. Take your snobbery elsewhere and stuff a cork in it.

And then to really tweek the wine snobs — that’s not why I do it, again, it’s my preference — when I do have red wine, I like mine chilled. No doubt that statement is sending many a sommelier into a hissy fit on the light side, and for others a full-fledged turrets syndrome attack. C’est la vie.

That Room Temperature Statement

This is my personal gripe: “Red wines should be at room temperature.” Because this has been apparently handed down for hundreds of years, the wine snoots take it as “the credo”. Thing is, they may not be so much wrong. It’s just the snoots seem incapable of grasping a common sense truth: that when someone 400 years ago uttered that, they did so without the having envisioned central heating.

My point: Whose room temperature? What room temperature?

Seems everyone has heard of the red wine at room temperature statement, but it’s exact origins and timeline can’t be pinned down. For me, I’ve always thought this notion came from Europe and somewhere around or after the Renaissance. I’m not sure if this is true, but thinking of the height of wine making in Western culture, one things of kings, castles, friars and abbeys. It seems logical.

As for the present, I’d say the average modern household, at least in America is probably 68-72°F. In a restaurant, it often tends to be a bit warmer than I would like, usually 76-78°F. Not sure why, though I can guess everything from trying to pack in patrons, poor ventilation and heat just escaping from busy kitchens is as good an answer as any. All I know is restaurateurs tend to take the “room temperature rule” literally and without compensating for history. For one last time, let me shout it from the rooftops — and the wine cellars — no one ever meant for red wines to be served at 75-plus degrees!

Interestingly enough when I started this article and I began searching around the web to add some hard facts to bolster my case, I came across a lot of opinions, and a few interesting facts. To my delight it seems where my strong feelings on this matter were once rebellious and contained among a very small piece of society; today there’s a whole lot more people similar feelings on the subject.

From 2basnob.com: “Most people know to drink red wine at room temperature, but that is not really true. Unless of course, you keep the temperature in your house similar to that of an old English castle. Most reds taste best between 62°F to 65°F (16°C to 18°C).” Regarding drinking temperature, I think this guy is pretty close.

From CellarNotes: “Cellar temperature is usually about 55 degrees which is perfect for storing wine”. In terms of cellar temperature, this is the one most often given. Yet (as you will see in a minute with the “lager proof”) it’s still a higher temperature than a medieval cellar.

What’s the problem you ask? How to get a more accurate reading of what the temperature of a medieval castle’s cellar or a castle’s “great hall” where the wine and food was served. And where and when? Fall in a castle in London? Winter in a monastery in Vienna? Spring in a cloister in Budapest? And shall we choose 1812 or 1492 or when exactly? Too many variables. Some generalities (as above) could be made, but still, nothing scientific or more specific.

As to dating, I came across this in my searches this from a Barnes and Noble bookeditor: “That well-worn phrase was developed over 300 years ago in England when people gathered around the fireplace for warmth, but the rest of the room was cool.” So, pre-1700 in other words. I have no problems agreeing with that. The time a bit more pegged down; that major issue of temperature remained.

Lager Brewing Pinpoints Temperature

Yes, it was beer of all things that for me, gave me conclusive evidence. Specifically, the secret of red wine “room” temperature comes from the history of lager. What does making beer have to do with making wine? They were kept in the same places. It was on one of those Discover Channel type channels and a program on the History of Beer I saw a few years back, that I finally got my scientific answer. And that is that lager only ferments at a specific temperature range.

From Wikipedia: “Lager is the English name for bottom-fermenting beers of Central European origin. They are the most commonly consumed beers in the world. The name comes from the German lagern (”to store”). Lagers originated from being fermented in the cellars of Eastern European castles and monasteries which became quite cold. Lager yeast is a bottom-fermenting yeast (e.g., Saccharomyces pastorianus), and typically undergoes primary fermentation at 7-12°C (45–55°F) (the “fermentation phase”), and then is given a long secondary fermentation at 0–4°C (32–40°F) (the “lagering phase”). During the secondary stage, the lager clears and mellows. The cooler conditions also inhibit the natural production of esters and other byproducts, resulting in a “crisper” tasting beer.”

Aha! No guesses of room temperature or cellar temperature. A specific chemical reaction that is only achieved as a certain temperature range. Definite proof if not to the temperature of “the castle’s great hall”, then for certain on the cellars. 45-55°F was the temperature of the cellars in Europe. The same ones where they kept their wine — including red wine.

Let’s Bring This Up to Date

A modern refrigerator tends to be between 35-38°F. And the range of a living room to a restaurant’s “room temperature” is 70-76°F. Of these two places and temperatures, which is closest to the room temperature of a European wine cellar of 400 years ago? The fridge!

Now going around the Net, those who believe in the colder red wine say having it permanently in the fridge is too cold for a variety reasons. That too cold is nearly as bad as too warm. So the conventional wisdom is place your bottle of red wine in the refrigerator a couple of hours before serving.

To be candid, I’ve been keeping my reds in the refridgerator with my whites for days or a week on end. They say that’s too much. I’ll keep an open mind for one reason. I’ve never tried in “between”. My rallying against the too hot, was to go to fridge, which may have been an extreme a bit too much the other way. So, I’ll give it a try at the somewhere between temp before making an opinion. (And of course I will let you know the results).

Now, all of this having been said, something you need to know. It’s up to you. If you like red wine cold, do it. Heck, if you really do like red wine warm, go ahead and do that too. Anyhow the next time some snoot says “you are mistaken, this must be at room temperature” you can educate him on the science and history of distillation, fermentation and historic temperature variances.

Ok, so if the fridge takes care of the at-home thing … What to do at restaurants then? Get into a brawl? Submit to hot lousy wine?

That B&N editor I mentioned above suggests to simple tell the waiter to place the bottle in an ice bucket for 10-15 minutes and then come back and serve it. I then found very similar recommendations elsewhere — including from some restaurant critics. The revolt begins!

Who knows? At this rate, maybe restaurants will actually start to get a clue and start serving reds chilled without having to be lectured. Meanwhile, educate and get your way. Next time you want a chilled red and the waiter starts his nasally intonation about “room temperature” you tell him to stick it … in the ice bucket. And ignore the upturned noses and muffled throat-clearings when they do so. The customer is always right. And you and I are the customer. Cin cin!

Where does cooking inspiration come from? Well I can only say where it comes from for me. And it’s a variety of sources. Hmm, before I go on, I should explain. I’m not talking about following existing recipes, I’m talking about making my own up.

Often they are inspired from other recipes. I might be watching at television cooking show and say, hmm, that’s interesting. But you know, I’m not sure I really like that particular ingredient. I think if you switched that with this, it would taste much better. Come to think of it, I’m not too impressed with that second ingredient either. Not only would this other thing go better with theirs, in my opinion, but with the first switch, this would defnitely enhance that as well.

It often comes from several recipes. Hmm. Now this person did it this way. And that chef did it that way. And the third cook it the other way. I think they all had something, but not one of them got it on the money, I’m going to take the best part from each and fuse it into a totally new one of your own design.

Sometimes it comes from meals I’ve had before at a restaurant that I recall enjoying so much that I want to recreate them as closely as possible, or maybe some sort of variant on it.

Sometimes it’s looking at an item, at the store, on a television commercial, a website, my own frig and saying what can I do with this that’s not the same. Sometimes it’s the ingredients or the spice that makes me say, do I have anything in the house that I could do something with that?

On occasion one is motivated to do it because there’s a batch of lefovers and a desire to “do something else” then just reheat them. On other occasions, like bravery or an episode of “Dinner: Impossible” it’s thrust upon us. Such as when there’s unexpected company coming and you have 45 minutes to make some special from “nothing.”

Other times it doing something common and saying there must be a way to pick his up, take it to that next level. I recall when i was first dabling with cooking and I looked at tasty but same old tuna fish salad and thought, what if besides mayo I added some of this creamy italian dressing? Mmm-mmm. Simple but gave it a nice blast of taste. I wouldn’t want it all the time, but once in a great while, I do enjoy having it again.

Funny, creamy italian dressing also played a part in another of my very early, and successful, experiments. Cooking chicken breasts in the oven, and five minutes before they come out, I poured some creamy italian on it. Woohoo! Shocked the family. It’s another super simple way to perk up something from the norm and give it a totally different, better dimension. And again, once in a great while, I’ll remember it and do it to this day. It really is the epitome of simple and delicious at the same time. Give it a try yourself.

So, whether it’s adapting an existing idea, bettering it, taking two or three different versions fo the same recipe and making your own fusion, or looking at a cut of beef, or a bottle of vanilla extract or even a bottle of salad dressing — cooking inspiration comes from many places. Just let it flow. Shake off the old ideas of “it has to be this way” and ask yourself: “what can I do that I’ve never done before?”

And finally, don’t let the mistakes derail you. Yes, you may have messed up dinner. You may have screwed up five bucks worth of chicken or be sorry you wasted your last bunch of tomatoes on something unappealing. Learn from it. And grow. And try again!

I guess if I had to choose what was my so-called signature dish this would be the one.

This recipe wasn’t inspired by anything I saw elsewhere, just the ingredients at hand. I had a lot of left over ricotta and didn’t want to make another desert with it; in other words, I’d already done sweet, now I wanted to do something savory. There was chicken on hand, and frozen spinach too. Aha, florentine. The incredible sauce came about as an after thought initially when I had made way too much stuffing. And then the sauce was so wonderful it just had to be put on something, and thus came the idea for egg noodles as I was tired of putting things atop the usual pasta or rice, and the noodles seemed to lend itself better to it. (That said, you could substitute fettucini I’m betting, but still, how often do you have an egg noodle dish? So I’d still go with the noodles as my number one choice.) It’s my very own version of a classic and so rich and tasty, I tend to even over-eat this meal at times.

I’m pretty proud of all of my dishes (or I wouldn’t share them with you.) But I’m also tough on myself and usually think even my finished dishes could sometimes use improvement. (Maybe some can, most I probably should leave well enough alone.) But this is definitely one of personal favorites that I think is at the top of it’s game, so I’m very proud of this one.

Now, since we’re using four large half-breasts it seems like the natural thing to say is “this serves four”. And it does, but — they have to be really hungry. Remember, large chicken breasts. The one I had the other night, I was stuffed as much as the chicken when I was done. So afterwards I figured out, four in a package, package was three pounds. If they were of equal size that would have been 12 ounces each, and my piece was the largest in the bunch so it was probably on the order of 14 or 15 ounces. Plus it’s stuffed plus a plate full of starch underneath it. Therefore, you could probably serve six easily, and maybe stretch it out to eight (and still give folks around 6 to 8 ounces of chicken, so not bad a stretch that.) Serve it family-style instead of individually. Since it’s stuffed, a row of nice one-inch slices over that bed of noodles will look very attractive too!

By the way, I have to mention, there is something about this dish (and others) that drives me crazy. It’s not the making of it, it’s the relaying of it. You see, I have always so been one of those folks who puts together in ingredients on the fly, as needed, not one who measures. Alas to share my recipes, things need to be measured. Here in lies the rub: Too many variables!

For instance in this very recipe, the chicken breasts I bought turned out to be roughly 30% larger than the one’s I cooked when I first came up with this recipe several months ago. That meant two slight problems: I initially hadn’t made enough sauce (and had to up the ingredient amountts) and also an additional 10-15 minutes was required in cooking time. Now how does anyone give out exactling measurements when the very fact of two “large” breasts can mean very different things to very different people? How can I be exact when the breasts I myself purchase from the same supermarket might vary as much as 20-40% in size from one time to another?

Not sure what the answer is. I’m a long time cook, but a very short time recipe writer. All I can say is, I hope this works for you. If not, you’ll need to adjust. And I suppose that is the answer right here. That it ends up being up to you. A good cook, a long time cook, knows this is not all written in stone and to change up as circumstances dictate. For you new cooks, you’ve been warned: Adjust as necessary. And when it comes to recipes, remember what Captain Jack Sparrow says “There’s not so much rules as they are guidelines.”

Harry’s Stuffed Chicken Florentine
©2007 Harry Kenney

ingredients

2 large boneless, skinless breasts cut in half (4 half-breasts)
8-10 oz frozen chopped spinach, cooked
1/2 medium (or 1 small) yellow onion, diced
2/3 cup ricotta
1/2 cup (total) grated parmigiano (two 1/4 cups actually)
2 cloves garlic
garlic powder
salt
pepper
1/4 pint heavy cream (can substitue light cream)
1/2 cup dry white wine
8oz egg noodles (often this is half a bag)

Frying pan to medium heat, add cooking oil, two garlic cloves sliced, onion, lightly brown, add cooked frozen spinach (cooked in microwave covered for 3 minutes prior to this), add 1/2 cup of ricotta, 1/4 cup grated parm, salt and pepper, lower heat a bit and mix together for about two minutes. Let this cool down enough so you can work with this with your hands.

With a sharp knife make pouches in sides of the chicken breast pieces (see photo above) and place in as much of the warm (not hot) spinach mixture as possible. You may or may not want to toothpick these for better closure. Season both sides of chicken with salt, pepper and garlic powder and place in frying pan, medium-high heat, cooking oil, brown both sides of the chicken, 3-5 minutes per side.

While browning the chicken. Preheat oven to 400 degrees, and take the remaining stuffing from the frying pan and put into a medium sauce pot. Add in the cream and the white wine. (A drier, more medium-bodied wine such as Pinot Grigio is preferred. Don’t use a sweet wine in this.) Stir and mix together well over low heat . As we are transforming our stuffing into a thinner sauce of more volume, you need more seasoning, so add salt, pepper and another 1/4 grated parm. Stir off and on, this should take 3-4 minutes. You do not want to reduce this mixture, btw.

Pour a little bit of the sauce into the empty casserole dish (or dishes if chicken pieces are very large) just to coat. Place chicken on top, pour rest of sauce completely around the chicken and some on top. Cover with aluminum foil. Place in heated 400 degree oven until done (when it reaches an internal temperature of 165-175 degrees F). Depending on oven, chicken pieces etc, this will take about 35-50 minutes.

About 15 or 20 minutes before chicken is done, cook egg noodles in boiling water, drain fully. Remove chicken from casserole dishes, put on side for moment. On each person’s plate, make a bed of noodles, spoon over liberally with florentine sauce, place chicken on top, add a little more sauce to top of chicken and serve.

Personally, I don’t think any side veggies are needed with this meal. Myself, I like serving it with some chilled cranberry sauce and a glass of white wine on the side — preferably the same wine used in the dish — although a slightly sweeter, fruitier wine would work nicely too.

I love and I hate this show sometimes. I’m talking about the current season of “Top Chef” shown on Bravo. Make that shown and shown and reshown and shown again so much on Bravo that it’s beginning to appear the have only one show in their lineup. Enough with reruns of the reruns all week

From what I’m seeing, the judging is all over the place lately. This week, with Tre, I hate to admit it, but they were 100% correct. Did Tre have a bad night, yes. How bad? Three items bad. What about last week? I recall the over-smoked potatoes and something else wrong. That’s two weeks in a row, not one.

What really steamed me was the episode on two or three weeks ago — yes, so steamed that this far afterwards I’m still mad enough to decide to write about it. That was the one where they tricked the contestants into thinking they were having a night out on the town but ended up making late night snacks and serving them out of a truck until dawn.

This time, the judging was simply dreadful. First the judges put the crew altogether in an uncomfortable, psychologically demoralizing stunt with the “night out” turned into “cooking with your best clothes on.” Second and worse, the judges created an environment where the women in high heels had to cook, and unlike the guys couldn’t quite take their shirts off. So you slanted an even contest purposely in a manner that put a greater onus on some contestants than others. Major mistake!

And then because cooks need salt and pepper, here comes the throwing of the salt in the wounds, the judges asked the women what they thought, and both women — rather holding back instead of giving it to them as they deserved — politely told them that working in heels and dresses and deep cut blouses was not very comfortable … then got their words spit back them, mostly by Tom by the way, and if not enough, the judges then used those same words to get rid of one of the women — in other words, the producers and judges behind the show set up a scenario that gave certain contestants had greater strain then others, and of course then offed one of those very constestants that had this unfair bias slanted against them. This was truely the show’s greatest low point so far this season.

Would be nice if the producers and judges would fess up and admit that is what they did, instead of attempt to sweep that one under the rug. Better yet, I’d like to see Ted and Tom dressed in drag with four-inch heels running around the supermaket and then standing in the heels for eight hours serving burgers. Then let’s see if they have the same opinions. Chances are they’d have done full 180s.

Definitely the low point of the season so far.

What makes for great cooking? Two simple things: How it’s cooked and what’s in it. And when it comes to the latter, we need to look at the concepts of complimenting and contrasting.

Whether it’s making a single dish or the entire meal “go up another notch” lies in the complimenting and contrasting. Let’s bring this down further. Complimenting is comparatively easy, contrasting isn’t. And of the two, it’s the more important element. And that’s what we’ll be concentrating on.

My favorite definition for “contrasting” I’ve found is “to set in opposition in order to show or emphasize differences”. When it comes to cooking, then, make that: “to showcase or emphasize flavors”.

There’s no way not to for a moment go “zen” on you here. Because this is definitely one of those cases of what is called “yin and yang”. Out of curiosity I took a look at what Wikipedia had to say about “yin and yang” (which was a ton) but two defining phrases stood out among the rest: “complementary opposites rather than absolutes” and “combining to create a unity of opposites“. These are totally perfect definitions when applying this concept to the art of cooking.

In the ingredients of a single dish

Let’s start out by examining something that almost everybody is familiar with, a substance which contains a large amount of ingredients, with complex and contrasting tastes, high notes of robustness and low notes of subtly, and can vary greatly from one cook’s recipe to anothers: namely, barbeque sauce.

For me, I usually start with a ketchup base, then some worcestershire, then some dijon mustard (mild hotness, lots of tang), a bit of cayenne for true hotness, some honey to offset with sweetness, cumin for a more neutral base with a natural smoky component, ginger to add sweetness and tang and smidge of heat; soy sauce to both calm it down and introduce the element of saltiness … Getting the idea? It’s the balanced harmony of these contrasts.

Speaking of BBQ, another recipe pops into mind, last year put together basically a rub and mixed in a little oil making a thick dark strong paste and covered it all over these eight boneless chicken thigh pieces, let them marinate a little then placed them on the grill. Juicy on the inside, crust on the outside, quite seasoned and lots of “zing”.

I served them on potato rolls with mayo and tomato. Very very simple, but you see how everything else counter-balanced the heat of the main component of the chicken: the tangy and sweet freshness of the tomato, the wet coolness of the mayo and even the sweetness of the bun. Big thumbs up all around from my guests! (And hey, dark meat, very flavorful and yet price-wise we’re talking cheap eats, too!)

In the meal, between the various dishes

Here’s some simpler examples. Ever have buffalo chicken wings? Essentially these hot wings are almost always accompanied with a side of blue cheese dressing and some celery to provide a coolness factor. Another example is the basic vinagrette for salad. The two main ingredients are the oil and the acid; the former usually from olive oil, the second from either vinger, citrus (often lemon, lime, or orange juice) or alcohol. And then there are the rest of the ingredients (which could include salt, pepper, honey, dijon, basil) again adding some contrast. And speaking of salad, in a restaurant what often comes with one but bread or breadsticks. Why? To offer a more neutral component to balance out the salad. Salad is zesty; bread is crunchy, perhaps a little buttery. That’s why they often go so well together.

My mother got me to love apple sauce as much as she does. (Btw, we’re not talking bland super-pureed apple sauce, btw, we buy the big plastic jar that has “natural” and “chunky” on it. We also get the one that has some cinnamon added.) Often when I serve something hot like my spanish rice dish, apple sauce provides a welcome cool down on the side. Sometimes when I can’t think of something else to go with a zesty tomatoey pasta dish, again apple sauce provides a welcome change for the palette. Same reason garlic bread marries so well with pasta.

Even with the accompanying beverage

I bring this concept of contrasts not only to a single dish or meal on the plate but whenever possible to the accompanying beverage itself. If I’m having something hot and “basic” — chicken wings, hot nachos — I might go with something like a light beer.

If it’s spicy but a bit more complex such as say gumbo or a spicy rice concoction or a curry, I’ll again usually go “opposite” with a contrasting light, sweeter wine such as White Zinfindel or maybe a fruity Rheinhessen with it; if I’m in the mood for something non-alocholic then a glass of ginger ale or lemony iced tea goes well.

On the other hand if I’m having something more meaty and robust, let’s say a thick steak or pork chop, I tend to go more for something complimentary instead, such as a deep red Merlot or an amber lager such as Yuengling. (If you don’t know Yuengling, try it. It’s much better in my opinon than Sam Adams, which gives too much of an over-hops bitter after taste; Yuengling doesn’t. Alas, it’s sold in only ten eastern states currently. On the west coast, I suggest Anchor Steam.)

To the next level

Funny how folks look at things differently. Often if someone sees a recipe for something like a mango or pineapple salsa, first thing they say is “yuck, why put that hot stuff with that nice sweet fruit?” When (to me, at least) the idea is 180 degrees: let’s add some sweet fruit to that hot salsa. Either way, it’s a more interesting and a more complex taste. Very often the same folks who initially heard that and thought it would be terrible, change their minds when they are actually taste these “conflicting” combinations together and go “yum”.

What we’re talking about above is doing something where the average person doesn’t expect it to work together. Everything says to them that’s not right; but then they taste and the tongue tells them otherwise.

Even big time chefs can be fooled at times. I love it when I’m watching some sort of cooking competition on television and this happens. Every once in a great while you’ll have a couple of food judges say “I really didn’t think the X would play off the Y, but it works. This is amazingly good.” And the next judge agrees, saying “It was a total surprise to me too. I would have thought the X would have overwhelmed, or bounced off the Y, instead it actually brings out a more robust component of the Y.” In short, even in the land of haute cuisine, one chef can come across a food combination that is so opposite to another, yet together work so well, that even other experienced chefs or foodies can be blown away by it.

Anyways, I think when it comes to complimenting most people have that down pretty well — baked beans go with hot dogs; mashed potatoes are a must with meat loaf;, etc — without going into to it at all. It’s the yin and yang, the contrast, the balancing of textures and the playing flavors off each other that most cooks need to work on. And when you bring these different tastes into harmony, into that “unity of opposites” that’s when you’ve taken normal cooking up to a much higher level.

Here’s a bit of a departure. This recipe uses pretty much all off-the-shelf ingredients to make a nice quick meal and a trip for the tongue to another country’s cuisine.

Yes, I like fresh. But I also like fast. So what happens when they conflict? Which one wins out? Pretty much the same answer as everyone else: When the difference in the end taste is comparitvely small and the difference in the time to make it is relatively great, then go with the quick one. (And conversely, if a little bit of increased time produces a much more tastier dish, then go with the fresh.)

After all, how often do you make your own pasta from scratch — if ever? Salsa, sure you could make your own, but why when you can grab a jar at the market or local convenience store that tastes excellent? Tortillas. Are you really going to grind the meal together on a stone and put them in a brick oven? Why not go harvest the corn while you’re at it? Yes, I kid. So this is definitely one of those times when store-bought or pre-packaged works out for best.

Was the above necessary? Um, probably not, but I’m feeling a bit (needlessly) guilty for offering something so basically simple. Then again, flavorful, fast and simple. Nothing to be guilty about at all. You will find this so vastly superior to it’s fast food derivative, you’ll find yourself making this at home again and again.

Right now, this is a nice family meal. I’ve made the proportions below to serve two. This way, it’s super easy to double it once and it’s a family meal. Double it again, and you’re on your way to delicious party food. Also, this recipe works well if you substitute ground beef. However, when I substituted chicken I found it over-powered by the salsa and other ingredients.

Btw, I’m from Philadelphia where we love pizza and we created the Philly cheesesteak. This dish is such a wonderful Mexican combination of the two. How can you not love it!

Steak Quesadilla
©2007 Harry Kenney

ingredients:

4 soft flour tortillas (preferably the larger, 10-inch diameter ones)
1/2 cup salsa (choose your heat)
handful of shredded Mexican cheeses
4 frozen thin steaks (the paper-thin ones for sandwiches)
one diced medium yellow onion

garlic powder
chilli powder
cilantro (optional)
salt
pepper

recommended sides:

box of rice primavera (for this meal, suggest Goya over Ricearoni)
can of refried beans

In the above proportions, serves two
Prep time: None
Cooking time: 10 minutes (longer with the rice)

If you’re doing sides (like rice or refried beans) get them going before you start on this main event.

The following is optional, but it gives it more a realistic and deeper taste with the crispier tortillas and can be a whole lot of fun too. (Just keep the kids away.) Take out four tortillas. You need a top and a bottom for each serving. Turn on the front burner on low. With tongs (or two tablespoons used as tongs), take one and place it directly atop the burner. (See photo.) You want a slight browning or scorching on each side. Roughly three to eight seconds per side, depending. Do it on the other side and to the remaining tortillas and reserve.

Dice the yellow onion and place in hot pan, medium heat with oil. Let them get transparent and lightly golden.

With the four portions of thin frozen steak, either let them defrost on the counter for about five minutes or place them on a plate in the microwave for about 40 seconds on high. Normally to make these, you want them in the pan immediately so they don’t fall apart. For our use, you want them to fall apart. In fact after the defrosting or microwave, crumb them up with your hands onto the plate so you have a nice loose pile of the steak. Add to pan with onions, turn heat up slightly to medium-high. Season with the spices. Cook until brown, but steak is still moist; don’t overcook.

Take a plate. Place a paper towel atop it, and one tortilla atop that. Put half the steak onto the shell and move it around for even distribution. Take several tablespoons of the salsa and do the same. Take some of the shredded cheese in hand, and place around likewise. Make certain a small amount of the cheese gets to the very ends, as this well help with sealing.

Top this with second tortilla shell. Give a firm but light push overall, and also push around the end edges. Place in microwave for 40 seconds on high. (The paper towel will ensure the bottom shell doesn’t moisten. It will also help catch any overflow of the ingredients.) Take out and let sit a minute and build the next one.

Slice your quesidilla with a pizza slicer preferably, or carefully with a knife so you end up with four segments or triangles. With your fingers push around all the edges to help “seal” it a bit. Serve by itself or with the suggested sides or your own sides.

Easily turn this meal into party food by taking the above proportions and times it by 2.5 — that is, using all 10 tortilla shells.. Now instead of putting it out piece meal by “sandwich”, serve it up as a stack of 20 quesadilla triangles and let folks take as much or as little as they want. Fiesta!

You can probably do this with a can of pineapple rings … but … they’ve been so long in their own syrup, it might not work. Probably would work in a pinch. Not as well, but well enough. (One day I’ll try it and let you know.) In any event, when in season, I love fresh pineapple. How can anyone not?

Ok, you’re wondering where the photograph of the finished product is … I don’t have one this time. Enjoy the one here of them on the grill and use your imagination. What happened? Family and friends were literally taking these out of my hands as I was finished making each one! Not making this up either!

I’m there going, “Wait wait, I gotta take a photo first!”. And this one’s going “No, the ice cream is melting with the warm pineapple” and takes her dish away. Then my buddy goes “Gimme my ice cream already, you can take a picture of the empty dishes and that’ll show’em how good it was. What more do you want?” and he takes his. Then I look at mine and say “Eh, what the heck …”

Really happened. I kid you not. So photos of the finished product hopefully next time! You know what? Naw! The pic of them on the grill says a thousand words already.

Rum-Soaked Grilled Pineapple (over Ice Cream)
©2007 Harry Kenney

One fresh pineapple
1 cup of (light) rum
1-2 tbsp sugar

Added bits:

Vanilla ice cream
Chocolate jimmies
Whipped cream

Take the fresh pineapple. Get rid of tops and side skins. Cut down middle making 1/2 inch circles. Leave the core as it’s needed to hold them together on the charcoal grill. Put the slices in a bowl and add a cup or so of rum. Move the pineapple about to get them covered. Leave soak for about five minutes, come back, move them around again.

Drain the liquid — preferably in a glass for later drinking. Pat down both sides with paper towel to get off the excess. (So the grill can better brown the outsides.) Sprinkle a bit of sugar on both sides. This too will help with the browning and the caramelization.

Place them on the grill until you see they are getting nice brown grill marks on both sides. Varies by heat and a lot of things but roughly two, two-and-a-half minutes per side. Btw, I find transporting them out and back on a cookie sheet works great. You still want some “heft” to the pineapple, and you don’t want them overly brown or cooked. Bring back in and let cool just enough that you can work with them.

Forget the knife, I like nature to tell me what to pull off and what to leave. So going around each circle, pull off chunks with your fingers and place over vanilla ice cream. One circle’s worth of pineapple per dish of ice cream works fine. Serve that way or add your favorite toppings, just don’t let the added topics overwhelm the star of this show. For mine, I added a light dusting of chocolate jimmies and whipped cream worked nicely.

This is one of those meals I had way long ago. It was my first big vacation when I was out on my own. It fell at the end of September, top of October and my initial choice of the Bahamas looked to be too shaky with hurricane season. So I took my second choice first: Santa Fe-Taos area of New Mexico. Why? What’s not to love? American Indian pueblos, a church bell cast before the Pilgrims landed, Indian art, cowboy art, the home of Georgia O’Keefe, southwestern cooking, adobe houses, you name it.

It was also the first vacation I took solo, and learned the art of eating by one’s self. And one of the things they all suggest for dining alone is to slowly savor the food. Maybe that’s why I remember one of those meals, this one, so well. Maybe that’s in part why I became a “foodie” and then got into cooking. Anyhow, this is my best effort recreation of that awesome breakfast I had one day in some restaurant in Santa Fe. I think it turned out pretty delish if I say so myself.

Before we jump in, a few words of advice. I’d never worked with jam, jelly before, ok, I have, with cookies, especially raspberry thumbprint cookies. But not quite in this manner as a fruit sauce. When I was trying to reduce it down and it wouldn’t get thicker I initially used a touch of cornstarch. That made it perfectly the thickness I wanted, and then I put the pan to the back of the burner and worked on the meat side (sausage) and the pancakes themselves.

Long story short, I pick up the pan to find it had cooled back to a thick jelly. Oh no! I’m not used to working with sauces that thicken when cooked, but thicken when heated. Thinking back I should have known that. Not from my own experience, but things I’ve heard and read about. In any event I saved it, that first version, by adding two tablespoons of OJ. The second time around I did what you read in the recipe below: reduced, added no thickner, put it to the side while still very watery looking, came back to it and was fine sauce.

One more thing, there are a variety of ways to make this sauce with fresher ingredients. As said, I used jam. You could instead use frozen rasberries or fresh ones. If you do, you will need to add sugar or simple syrup and macerate them with a liquour or something. In this specific instance, I purposely didn’t go fresher as I really wanted something to use up the jar of jam I had left over from baking. Enjoy.

Ricotta Pancakes with Raspberry Sauce
©2007 Harry Kenney

ingredients:

batter:

2 cups whole-milk ricotta
2 eggs
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
2 tbsps oil (vegetable, peanut, etc)
2/3 cup of milk

sauce:

1 cup of raspberry jam (seedless)
1/3 cup orange juice

Place the sauce ingredients into a small pan and mix. Keep low and stir often or it will quickly rise and overflow. Reduce somewhat. Note, you will take this off the heat while the mixture looks much too thin; it will thicken considerably after you have removed it from the heat. If too thick when you come back after making pancakes, add a tablespoon of the OJ and mix and heat up a bit.

Blend all the batter ingredients together. A tablespoon works fine, but your choice. Spoon 1/4 cup of batter into frying pan until golden brown and flip. 3-4 minutes per side. Makes 8 pancakes. Drizzle the rasberry syrup on and across the pancakes. Note this concentration goes a long way. Get too liberal with the sauce and it may be too sweet. Start out more sparingly and you can always add more to the plate.

We all love fresh herbs. And yes I too highly recommend them. But let’s face it. We can’t all just walk down the street or hop in the car and get fresh herbs every day. Sometimes not even every week and with a three to five day shelf life, very often life intrudes here in the real world enough, that by the time you’re finally ready to cook that put-off (and put-off and put-off) dish you’ve been wanting to do, you go in the fridge only to find wilted, blackened or spotted, but definitely unusuable herbs. So often, it’s the dried herbs and spices we lean on to get the job done. And you know what? There’s nothing wrong with that! We all do it.

Here’s some of my thoughts about those things that make food go round. Spices and liquor.

1. Onion salt, Garlic salt, anything spice that has added to it “salt” — with the exception of true, actual 100% salt — there’s only one thing you have to do. Which you must do … toss them out!! You want onion powder and garlic powder! It’s partly the health thing, but it’s as much the control thing. If a bunch of your spices are putting salt in, then how can you possibly control the salt intake or the salt amount in your dish? You can’t. So “powder”, yes; “salt”, no.

What about celery salt? There is no celery powder. Ok, one exception. Although really, just use salt and buy fresh celery, it’s cheap. But if you have to, one exception and use sparingly.

2. Any spices that have been sitting around forever — replace them!! You know what I’m talking about. The little white and red tiny tin of cinnamon and paprika at the back of your cabinet, the one’s from the Johnson Administration. Yeah. Out! Buy fresh ones. You’ll be glad you did.

3. Every time you go to the market grab a few new spices you’ve been wanting to try. Over time build up a nice stash, a spice “armory” where you can do almost anything. Then maybe pick a country, a region or type of cuisine … say Asian … pick up some soy sauce and some ground or powdered ginger (hey, yes you can use it in cookies for Christmas as well) and some dark Soy Sauce if you don’t have it already … maybe next time, get your some Chinese Five Spice Powder … next time, think Southwestern or Mexican and pick up some cilantro and some tabasco or hot sauce …

4. Cooking wine? Toss it out! Even before you toss out the dried spices with salt! Yuuuck! Simple rule: If you can’t drink it, do not not not cook with it! Never never never! It’s yet another way they sneak salt in. Another way you lose control. But worst of all, it tastes rotten. Anything that tastes horrible if you were to gulp some down, is going to taste that way when you put it your cooking. Simple.

One wine I can’t live without: Marsala. You want to perk up pork chops? This is it. You may never do a pork chop without this after you’ve had it. Plus it’s good with steaks. And Chicken Marsala is definitely among my (many) favorite meals.

5. And while we’re at the market pick up some liquor along with your wine. Don’t drink alcohol? No problem. It’s still a very often used ingredient in cooking and heat burns it off.

Most of you need no convincing, but for those who might … Don’t you have extracts in your kitchen? No doubt even if you don’t bake you probably have vanilla extract. So what are extracts exactly? Concentrated flavorings either diluted with alcohol or fermented (aka pretty much started out as alcohol) from berries, fruits, roots, beans of the type of extract. If that doesn’t convince you alcohols are a major part of the seasonings of cooking, then nothing will. Well, at least until you actually taste the difference yourself (for you first timers).

You’ll need Rum for Caribbean foods as well as in Italian and American cakes and cookies. Tequila of course for some Mexican dishes. (Tequila and lime chicken is yum.) Even chain restaurants like Bennigans have gotten in the act with such entrees such Jack Daniels sauce atop steak.

Heck I use Godiva chocolate liqueur in chocolate chip pancakes (though admittedly cream de cocoa would be a lot cheaper – but I happen to have the Godiva, so what the heck!) This is unusual because normally I substitute Triple Sec for Grand Marnier. (Why? Same reason I don’t use filet mignon in a beef stew.) So yes, swinging “upscale” with the Godiva is only because it’s on hand.

What else? Hmm, just the other day I splashed some Southern Comfort and some sugar on top of fresh strawberries while making the topping for an Italian cheesecake. Turned out to be a nice choice. Couldn’t even taste it, yet it gave the sauce an added character that was definitely appreciated.

To sum up, yes, use fresh when you can. But there’s nothing wrong with dried — unless it’s been sitting on your shelf 10 years.

Experiment! Buy one or two of what you might consider more unusual spices every shop and built up your spice arsenal. Never buy dried spcies with salt in them, and same goes for so-called cooking wine. There is no such thing as “cooking wine”, remember that; there is simply “wine”. And while you’re add it get some stronger liquor for your cooking too. Without seasonings dishes are blah. With the same old four or five seasonings only, you’re doing yourself a disservice.

So, boost up that spice arsenal and you’ll be making Cajun one day and Greek the next. And you’ll also take your normal every-day “same old” dishes and “up them” to a new level.

Now we all know I like to keep things simple. That doesn’t mean we can’t make some gourmet dishes or what’s called cuisine sometimes. It also doesn’t mean that we can’t buy some fancy gadgets or extra appliances. I mean let’s face it when you really get into cooking, you start to really want some things beyond the so-called “norm” of an average kitchen.

That said, simple is still good. And right now I want to share a few things I like that are simple. Are not expensive. Make your cooking easier on you. Makes your kitchen look a little pizzazz and gives you more control while cooking. What more you want in life: simple, makes things easier, cheap and more control.

Two things. Kruets and squeeze bottles. These are cheap. The kruets I got at a dollar store, yep, a whole buck a piece. The squeeze bottles (you want the ones with the caps!) I searched Google Products (formerly Froogle) and in a few minutes found them for $1.17 each at a crafts store. In fact, the others one found at cooking shops and such were 6, 8 or 12 ouncers. These babies were found at a crafts store at this price and at a sweet 16 ounces. And again, with caps!

Oil. I got tired lifting big bottles of oil and putting too much in my pan. I also wanted to save money by buying the huuuuge bottles of cooking oil and olive oil and put them into something smaller, nicer, and with a stem that would give me greater control. Voila, my kruets from the local dollar store. They have a nice little wicker or bamboo lattice on it. Important when, as you know, working with oil that can drip down the side and make things slippery. They don’t have caps but I think the curveture of the lip probably helps keep back evaporation (I could be wrong). Either way I have not noticed any appreciable evaporation using these.

Squeeze bottles. Thank Bobby Flay. I see him use these all the time and damn he just made me envious after awhile. Heck one time while visiting Emeril he made sure he brought one with his red sauce and green sauce to add in plating. Until recently I’ve avoided (laziness) getting some of these. But as I’m getting this website ready, and concentrating more on cooking, I’ve just ordered some. What will I do with them? hehe Anything I want of course. But seriously, not sure yet. Maybe some honey or chocolate sauce, maybe some red chilli or green pesto sauces (these what Bobby used? not sure, that’s ok, I’ll do my own, more fun that way.)

Maybe I’ll just keep them around and use them for different things on a recipe by recipe basis. I know in the past there have been times I wished I had something that gave me a bit more control. When I had some friends over for a cookout that ended with a strawberry shortcake meets ice cream sundae desert, and I couldn’t drizzle the strawberry sauce correctly over things with just a spoon. Made me wish I had a squeeze bottle, especially since the chocolate sauce from the fridge came in a squeeze bottle and I could make that ingredient look fancy, but not so the strawberry sauce.

Opps, didn’t think about biggie. For baking. You can use these to help frost cookies, cakes, whathaveyou … If the icing or frosting is too thick, use a frosting bag. Don’t have a frosting bag? Make a cheap one up using a ziplock quart size bag, seal the top, bunch it up, cut a snip off the end and viola!

There you have it. Thought I was going to recommend an ice cream machine or deep fryer huh? Not that I wouldn’t mind one of those. But for now … keeping it simple and cheap and easy.

If I had my druthers, the best way to do this recipe would be on my charcoal grill with the lid down — the perfect combination of flame and air moving all around the poultry. But that’s not the goal of this recipe. The challenge I set up for myself here was how to get a BBQ-like chicken with savory, crisp skin in the oven. (Cause not all of us are crazy enough to shovel through three feet of snow at 10 degrees F and use the outdoor grill in the winter. Or, for me the day I came up with this, it was was a 98 F day with 85% humidtiy. I’ll take the indoors with AC blasting and an oven on, then cooking by a roaring fire outside, thank you.)

This is one of those ideas that took two trys to nail down, call them version one and two. As I am known to say, you learn as much (if not more) by your mistakes. So I’m sharing it with you because like me, you’ll pick up some ideas when you run across these problems again. I certainly know I’ll be keeping these solutions in mind myself next time and at least avoid these same errors. (As always, you can feel free to skip down to the bottom and get the “unvarnished” recipe. Or take the ride with me and continue reading. Your chice.)

I knew there were going to be “technical details” when I came up with the idea for this dish. First, I wanted BBQ but with Orange and I hadn’t done anything like that before (not a biggie, just mentioning it was one element). Second was I was trying to BBQ inside, and because the pieces were large and thick, I knew I had to abandon the idea of the two-burner kitchen grill. That means grilling in the oven. (strictly speaking that’s not possible if you go by the exact meaning of the words, but I think you get the concept).

I wanted to add OJ to my sauce which make my base not so much ketchup but the orange itself, plus doing so would thin the sauce out. Second problem, getting a good crisp skin, an “eatable skin”, without charring the sauce atop it into black, burn. (When I say eatable skin, meaning I rarely eat chciken skin. But if I did it correctly even I would love it.)

And so came try numero uno with it’s mistakes and problems:

Mistake one … putting in large baking dish … for one, wasn’t exposing underside to air heat … two as it would fry, juices and fats would mix into bbq sauce … In short, I was cooking this like a chicken in a sauce dish. Why, I dunno. I had to make this it’s original intention: BBQd tasting chicken, crisp skin, in the oven. Silly me. So in version two (my second try at this the next day) I ended up removing and placing on wired grill atop baking sheet as should have

Problem one … As mentioned, the OJ made sauce too thin. (I think that’s one of the reasons I made the other error of putting it in a deep baking dish, because it would “hold” to some degree to the chicken, but not as much as I wanted, and I didn’t want a big mess.) So version one solution tried, helped a bit, some cornstarch. Cornstartch is a nice thickner which unlike flour does not require heat as an element. (Sure heat would help the thickening and did during the actual baking.) The answer I found was to reduce the sauce. More concentrated flavor and it thicken more to my liking.

Problem two: Skin did get crispy … but … could be cripsier … problem, at it’s best, would have left in any longer and bbq sauce would have burnt … how to more scripy without burning? Doing it in the casserole deep dish was the mistake. The simple answer was doing it atop the grill on sheet increased both the crispieness and let dry heat get under the poultry. One thing I did get right the first time, scoring the skin; second time I went from a few scores to around on dozen on each quarter.

Yes, I’ve done my best to ignore the option of placing it in the broiler for a quick bit at the end. Why? Too easy in one way. Too “dangerous” in another. How so? Remember, you can go from slightly crispy to burnt in as little as 20 seconds. Remember those of you who are masters of the outdoor grill this isn’t going to be 100% perfectly identical … but we’re trying for 95% or so and it gets there.

Now two challenges for you. First, see if folks don’t think you did it on the outside grill. See their eyes perk up when you tell them you did it in the oven. Second, those who love to eat chicken skin are going to think this is incredible; and while not all, some people who never eat skin, ask them to try this. I’m betting there will be one or two converts.

One last (and probably obvious observation to share) This is definitely a cost-cutter meal: cheap to buy and then you take it home and make it extra flavorful.

Roasted Orange-BBQ Chicken Leg Quarters
©2007 Harry Kenney

ingredients:

Four or five large chicken leg quarters (theighs and legs together)

mini rub:

1/2 tsp cayenne
1 tbsp chilli powder
1 tsp cinnamon
3 tbsp garlic powder
2 tbsp onion powder
1 tbsp paprika
1-2 tsps salt (this helps dry the skin as well as add flavor, that’s why a bit more than normal)
2 tsps pepper

sauce:

1 cup ketchup
3 tbsps worchestershire
4 tbsps honey
1 tbsps dijon (or brown)
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tbsp horseradish sauce
dash of salt
dash of pepper
1-2 tbsps lemon or lime juice (totally optional)
zest of one large orange (as much as you can get out of it)

Make many small scores through skin of top side of chicken. Mix dried ingredients and apply the rub to top of chicken; don’t neglect putting some on the under side. Put in plastic wrap and place in refrigerator for about 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, make the BBQ sauce as listed, placing all the ingredients in a small pot. As the OJ will have thinned the sauce, reduce it down until you get to a somewhat thicker consistency (such as that of say, steak sauce).

Preheat oven to 425. Baste chicken with sauce. Place on shallow wired rack atop baking sheet and place in oven. Expect this phase to take roughly 45 minutes (depending on your oven, size of chicken, size of bones, etc.)

15 minutes into it, turn chicken over. After 15 more minutes, again turn chicken over. Lightly cover the top of chicken with more of the BBQ sauce (not too thick, we want crispy skin.)

After chicken has been in for about 40 minutes, check with internal thermometer every 5-7 minutes until temperature is 150F. At this point turn oven to highest setting (often 500, some ovens go to 525 or 550). Skip checking with thermometer for now and instead check every 5-7 minutes for color and doneness visually. You will start to have a smoky kitchen at this point, that is normal.

When you feel it looks right and is done, again check internal temp. You must achieve a minimum of 165F to safely eat chicken. So when you are between 165-175F it’s perfect. Remove from oven and let rest at least ten minutes then serve.