I’m actually really impressed with myself this evening. This is the first dinner I’ve put together (other than my holiday meals) that I thought was really rockin’! And the kids, other than the grand baby, really liked it too.

Honey-Roasted Chicken
Tomato-Basil Goat Cheese Polenta
Caramelized Onions
Roasted Mushrooms

Most of these items came from here. Changes noted below.

The chicken quarters were slathered in honey and sprinkled with season salt, paprika, and garlic powder to taste. Baked covered at 425 until the last 10-15 minutes, then uncovered so they would brown. This is how I always do chicken: the meat remains nice and moist because all the moisture is kept in under the cover (we use foil), then it browns nicely in the last 10-15 minutes without losing that moistness.

The polenta followed the recipe as noted in the above link except we added 1 extra garlic clove and the cheese was a tomato-basil goat cheese. We only had 4 ounces of the goat cheese but the flavor still came through in a nice way.

For the caramelized onions, I used 2 brown and a little under half of a red.

Finally, for the mushrooms, we also minced 2 cloves of garlic and mixed that in with the mushrooms, salt, and pepper. We also roasted them a about 5-10 minutes longer. And they came out wonderful.

I plated the polenta first, topped that with onions, then the mushrooms, and with the chicken a little off to the side.

This really was a very satisfying dinner, and everything worked really well together taste-wise. Especially when making sure to get onion, mushroom, and polenta on the fork. The juices from the chicken and the chicken skin itself also really added to the flavor. I’m going to have to try this again, maybe with a little more of the goat cheese mixed in. I think the only thing I’d change is adding a green veggie to the plate, maybe some asparagus or something. The plate definitely needs a little more color. If the chicken hadn’t taken on the reddish color of the paprika, the plate would be nothing but yellow and brown.

I just might be able to make meals for the family that aren’t so boring. I remember before I met Chef, and my meals were pretty plain Jane. Heck, more often than not, I relied on boxed things—Hamburger Helper and the like. This dinner proves I don’t need to do that any more, and that I can play around with recipes successfully.

And that is just way cool.

This past Wednesday I was finally back up to playing in the kitchen. For this week: gnocchi. I found a recipe I liked that included Parmesan cheese and I added my own twist of Caramelized Onions and a reduced Balsamic Vinaigrette. Unfortunately, I had to take a look at several other gnocchi recipes as the dough originally came out very loose and sticky. A check revealed that it called for way too little flour: 1/2 cup versus 2 cups in other recipes that used less potatoes. I also chose to boil the potatoes like I would for mashed rather than baking. Not sure if that “shortcut” made a change in the results.

At any rate, I knew the sticky dough was a problem. I’ve eaten gnocchi only once, but I’ve seen it made on Top Chef, so I knew the dough wasn’t supposed to be sticky. It had to be a manageable dough that could be rolled out. I ended up needing all the flour that was missing to get the nice, non-sticky dough seen below.

After splitting the dough into 4 (the recipe suggested 5 pieces, but I think maybe 6 pieces would make it more manageable) pieces. The amount of dough I was working with at one time ended up being a bit much, but I suspect that’s mostly because we use a wooden cutting board to work with our pastry stuff, so I didn’t have the whole length of the table (and because of an accident with the table earlier, I couldn’t use it that way anyway).

Then came the cutting into “little pillows”. Some of them ended up not so pillow shaped and keeping the sizing consistent was a bit difficult, mostly because I had trouble rolling the pieces out to a similar thickness.

We did the boiling in batches, though I think next time I would try to have more in the pot at one time because as we continued to use the water, it seemed to make it take longer for the gnocchi to rise to the surface. Not sure what was going on, but the water was becoming milky, and I’m sure that had something to do with it. But we did little batches and drained on cleaned towels. They didn’t quite keep their shapes as little pillows.

With the gnocchi read to go, I caramelized my onions and set them aside.

We fried the gnocchi in the same pan as the onions. I was kinda hoping it would give the gnocchi a touch of that onion flavor, but I don’t think it did, especially for the later batches.

Grated Parmesan was mixed in with the finished gnocchi and it was served topped with the Caramelized Onions and a reduced Balsamic Vinaigrette. They tasted really good, and all but my potato hater and the Chef loved them. The Chef has determined he’s just not into gnocchi, while I keep saying he just needs to find the right recipe. I found them heavier than the ones I had at Creations, and I’m not sure why. I’m not sure if I’ll try them again since the Chef doesn’t particularly like them, but I might. I’m wondering if they can be frozen and used for bentos. I may have to try that at some point.

The entire meal, shown below, was a honey baked chicken (with paprika, ginger, and a touch of nutmeg), the gnocchi, and broccoli.

I’m not sharing the original recipe. As I said, the flour portions were off, so I’m concerned that the other ingredients were a bit off. I may use it again, now a little wiser on the flour, and play around with the other measurements. We’ll have to see.

We did have a Mystery Box this week that came out wonderfully. As soon as the Chef sends me pictures, I’ll post about it.

Wednesday nights are my cooking nights because the Chef is in class, and for the last few weeks I’ve been playing with polenta. The first polenta we tried was too sweet, but the second one didn’t have much flavor. I think this week we may have found one that’s just about right.

Tonight’s dinner was cheese polenta with garlic topped with roasted honey chicken and a side of apple-pepper “slaw”. I started thinking about it last night and we put it together today. Don’t have specific measurements for some of it, but we’ll give it a shot here.

I started with the boneless chicken, which I cut into 1-2″ strips (can’t see so well in the picture since the Chef deboned chicken leg quarters and they were, um, messy? lol). I added 1/2 a red onion, thinly sliced; 1/2 c. (or more) of honey; salt and pepper to taste; and about 1/2 tsp. of nutmeg. I mixed these and then let it marinate for an hour. The reason for the honey was to add some of the sweetness to the polenta when they’re combined.

Then we (my oldest daughter helped out tonight) prepped the mushrooms: washed them, cut them into 1″ slices, and combined with a little EVOO, salt, and pepper. They were then spread over a cookie sheet. The above is the mushrooms waiting to go into the oven.

Finally we prepped the slaw: 1 green bell and 1 red bell, both very thinly sliced; 1 Rome apple, also very thinly sliced; and some thinly sliced red cabbage. I mixed these in a large bowl with a little lemon juice (to keep the apple from browning). The above is the slaw waiting to be warmed up.

Now we were ready to get dinner together. Oldest started the polenta using this recipe but modified a little bit…very little bit, but a little bit (we also increased the amounts because we have 7 people to feed, lol):

2 garlic cloves, minced (we’ll be increasing this to 3 or 4 next time)
1 c polenta
2 c milk
2 c water
salt to taste
1 c shredded cheese of choice (we used colby-jack, but might try something stronger next time)

Sauté the garlic in a little EVOO until it just starts to turn brown. Whisk garlic, polenta, milk, water, and salt together in saucepan and bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring occasionally. After reaching a boil, turn heat to low and let sit with lid cracked for 15 minutes. Mix Parmesean into polenta.

While the polenta is cooking, place mushrooms in oven at 425 for 10-15 minutes. We found 10 to be too short.

In same pan that the garlic was sautéd in, sauté the honey chicken and onions until cooked through. Use a slotted spoon to place in bowl. Now add the “slaw” and sauté for about 5 minutes.

When ready, place some polenta on the plate, cover with some of the mushrooms, top with chicken and onions. Use tongs to add some “slaw” on the side.

I really was surprised how well this came out and at how much the kids liked it. Like I noted, we’re looking at adding more garlic and roasting the mushrooms a bit longer. Other than that, the flavors actually all worked out really well together.