I love the end of Winter as much as the beginning!

As excited as I get for the first snowfall, I'm equally excited about the "Spring" thaw. The days get warmer, the nights are still chilly and I can see the beginning of my daffodils pushing through! I also take this time as my last chance to cram in some good winter comfort food. I don't have a strong desire for creamy soups, chili or hearty casseroles in the heat of the summer. I decided to make my own version of a classic comfort item....Chicken Pot Pie, in soup form!

Start with the basics: a few carrots, a few stalks of celery (plus the leafy tops) and 1 small onion. Chop everything about the same size.

Throw into a large pot with a couple cloves of minced garlic and a few TBS of butter. I didn't really measure, just eyeball it :)

After the veggies had cooked for a few minutes, I added two large potatoes (peeled and cubed).

To the pot of veggies and potatoes, add about 6 cups of chicken stock or broth and bring to a simmer for about 25 minutes, or until veggies and potatoes are all fork tender.

I usually make my own stock by boiling a whole chicken. I found chickens a few weeks ago for $.39 a lb! I used just the white meat for this.

Add in the meat and then turn heat to Medium-High and stir in about 1 1/2 cups of Half and Half.

Let the soup thicken a bit and adjust with a cornstarch slurry. Mix a couple TBS of cornstarch with COLD water until smooth and gradually add until soup is thick enough. In the last few minutes of cooking, add a few handfuls of frozen peas and season well with Salt and Pepper. (I use LOTS of fresh cracked pepper!!!)

Serve with your favorite bread or biscuit. A hearty bowl of comfort to celebrate the end of Winter!

***If the soup isn't rich enough for your taste, you could also add a little Chicken Bouillon and use Heavy Cream in place of the Half and Half. ***

A football food everyone loves!

I love Hot Wings and my husband loves Hot Wings. The beauty of this relationship is that I actually like the "wing" portion and he likes the little drummies. We happily split orders of wings in this way :) We've had great wings all over the place and they all seem to carry a general theme....they are fried. Frying is messy business at home. I don't want or need a deep fryer. Frying makes my kitchen stink and uses tons of oil- not to mention it isn't the healthiest way to cook (Not that there is such a thing as healthy Hot Wings!). I searched for a long time to find a wing recipe I was happy with at home. Not only did I find a good recipe, I found a GREAT recipe!!! Thank you Alton Brown- Buffalo Wings!

It all starts with a steamer basket. Place the basket in a large pot with about 1 inch of water. Bring water to a boil.

Fill the pot with your wings and cover. Turn heat down to Medium. Cook thawed wings about 10 minutes and frozen wings about 15 minutes. Remove from the pot and place on a cookie sheet lined with paper towels. Refrigerate for 2 hours. I have cheated and done just 1 hour- they turned out fine :)

Remove the wings from the fridge and place on a cookie sheet lined with foil. Bake at 425 degrees for 20 minutes. Flip and bake another 20 minutes.

I use Frank's Red Hot Sauce...it is by far my favorite for wings and the brand used most in restaurants.

Heat about 1/2 cup of sauce with 4 TBS of butter- this will cover 24-36 wings. You can grate fresh garlic into this mixture as well, but I just throw in a few cloves of smashed garlic while it heats.

Toss wings in the sauce and serve with celery and Ranch or Blue Cheese Dressing. Do yourself a favor...if you are going to the trouble of making wings at home, make your own Ranch or Blue Cheese Dressing as well. It is so much better!!! I assure you, these are well worth the work and I will never prepare wings any other way. They get crispy just like Fried Wings, and they taste unbelievable!!

Liked it, but didn't Love it.

Sometimes, a recipe looks better than it tastes. Unfortunately, that was the case with one of my recent meals. I found the recipe for Smoky Southwest Chicken and Wild Rice Soup on Allrecipes. Good, not Great.

The recipe called for canned carrots, which was strange because it uses fresh celery and onion...so why not throw in fresh carrots? I did. I cooked my veggies in the olive oil for a few minutes before adding my chicken broth. It also called for cream of chicken soup...which I don't usually buy, so I used a little extra chicken broth and some corn starch.

I used homemade chicken broth (4 cups) and fresh shredded chicken. Heavy cream, canned chipotle in adobo instead of a pinch of chipotle powder, chili powder, cumin, pepperjack, cilantro, and 1 cup wild rice (minus the spice packet) .

Throw in everything but the cream, wild rice, cilantro and pepperjack - cook until the vegetables are soft. I checked for seasoning at this point and added black pepper, salt and some jalapeno powder. I mixed 1 TBS of corn starch with a little chicken broth and added that to the pot along with the wild rice. Stir in the heavy cream and pepperjack. Heat until thickened. Last- stir in the chopped cilantro.

 I topped mine with a little more shredded cheese and a couple cilantro leaves. I guess I didn't get much smoky flavor from this, and I would have liked a LOT more spice. As far as Chicken and Wild Rice Soup goes, that is about what it tasted like, plain Chicken and Wild Rice. I'll keep searching for new ways to actually make mine Smoky with Southwestern flavors :)

I love trying new things!

It's time for Hatch Chilies! Don't know what a Hatch Chile is....it's a unique pepper grown in New Mexico and it is just starting to be available around here. I noticed about a month ago that my local Hy-Vee was celebrating the Hatch Chile Festival. I decided to buy and roast a few pounds of these special chilies to see what all the fuss was about! Of course, I thought it would be a good idea to add them to my Chicken Tortilla Soup :)

In some areas of the country- you can buy fresh roasted hatch chilies at the grocery store. I roasted my own. I simply placed the rack in my oven on the highest level, threw the chilies on a cookie sheet and turned on the broiler.

Turn them a couple of times until they are black on all sides.

Toss them into a ziploc bag or a glass bowl with plastic wrap on top and let them steam until cool enough to handle. This makes the skins easier to remove.

After my last mishap with peppers, I decided not to take any chances and I wore gloves. The skins peel right off!

And- knowing now what I didn't know then...these peppers are HOT! I would cut off the stems and remove the seeds before roasting next time. Not to mention how irritating those little seeds are to remove after the pepper is soft :)

For my Chicken Tortilla Soup....you need 6 cups of chicken broth, one onion, 4 cloves of garlic, one can of diced tomatoes, one can of black beans, chili powder, garlic salt, cumin and CHICKEN!

Begin by tossing an onion and some finely minced garlic into the stock pot. I don't use oil, just 1/4 cup of the chicken broth to soften these.

And the chilies....normally I used 2- 4 oz cans of diced green chilies. I only needed 2 TBS of the Hatch Chilies and it was spicy enough!

Rinse the black beans and dump into the pot. Add the tomatoes and the rest of your chicken broth. I season mine to taste with cumin, chili powder and garlic salt. Sorry- I never measure. My chicken is usually shredded and frozen, so I add it once the broth is hot. Cook about 20 minutes over medium heat.

We like to eat ours with shredded cheese and crushed tortilla chips on top. This is a GREAT use for those crumbs at the bottom of the bag. I save them in ziplocs all winter to top all our favorite soups. 

***I froze the rest of the roasted chilies for use in various dishes over the Fall/Winter***

I love comfort in a bowl!

When my husband and I first started dating, he told me his favorite meal was his mom's Chicken and Dumplings. So- being the smart girl I am, I e-mailed her and asked for the recipe! 8 1/2 years later- I still use that recipe...and keep that e-mail just in case, even though I now have the recipe memorized. I've made my own tweaks, but the base is still the same. It's comfort food- plain and simple.

Ingredients:

2 Cups of Shredded Chicken 

8-10 cups of chicken broth or stock ( I make my own while boiling the chicken)

2 cups of Flour

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp of baking powder

6 TBS of Butter

1 egg

1/4 cup of milk

salt and pepper to taste

In a large mixing bowl- put 2 cups of Flour and 6 TBS of butter. Use a fork or a pastry cutter to mix until the mixture is crumbly. I also put my stock on the stove to start heating at this point. It needs to be over Medium High heat before adding the dumplings.

Add the baking powder and salt. Stir to combine. Beat together egg and milk and stir in. Dump the mixture onto a floured surface and knead to bring together.

When you dump this from the bowl, it looks dry, but as you start to knead it will come together into a smooth dough.

Using a rolling pin, roll dough to desired thickness. The dumplings puff as you cook them, so I roll mine really thin. My mother-in-law leaves hers very thick.

I like to use a pizza cutter to make my dumplings. I make mine into pretty skinny "noodles". My mother-in-law makes hers very wide. I cut these into about 2 inch pieces.

Drop dumplings into hot broth and stir so they don't stick. Cook over medium heat for about 30 minutes, stirring frequently.

I make lots of chicken at once and freeze it. I just throw a baggie in frozen and it thaws very quick in the hot soup.

At this point, I like to thicken up the broth a bit...so I mix 1 TBS of cornstarch with 1/4 cup of water and stir in. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Ta-da! A warm bowl of comfort. Easy and delicious...perfect on a cool Fall night.

Love the smells coming from the oven!!

After my crazy cheap Chicken weekend, I decided to roast one for dinner. A roast chicken is not complete without dressing...so I made that too :)

Start by stuffing a 3 lb chicken with a few ribs of celery.

Make a rub using garlic salt, paprika, black pepper and onion powder....about 1 tsp of each.

Brush the chicken with melted butter and apply the rub. Sprinkle the entire chicken with Kosher Salt and throw in a 350 degree oven.

I used my awesome remote thermometer to be able to watch the internal temperature without having to open up the oven. This is such an fantastic invention!!!

My chicken took about 1 1/2 hours (180 degrees internal temp)...and I basted it with the pan drippings a few times during the cooking process. Remove from the oven and cover with tin foil for 30 minutes.

Normally, I would set my bread out to dry overnight, but this was a spontaneous side dish. Instead, I cut my bread into cubes and placed a couple of baking sheets. Heat the oven to 350 degrees and bake until the bread is crispy.

Chop a few ribs of celery (I like the heart and use the leaves too). Also chop one medium sized white or yellow onion.

Cook the celery and onion in about 3 TBS of butter. Once softened, add in ground sage, salt and pepper. I also added about 1 1/2 cups of homemade chicken stock.

Toss the celery/onion mixture with the bread cubes (adding more stock if needed to moisten it) and place into a greased baking dish.

I also cut up 1 TBS of butter and dot the top with it. Bake at 400 degrees for about 20 minutes, or until the top is just crisping!

Serve with chicken and your favorite vegetable...which for us, is sweet corn on the cob!

I love a great deal!

My local grocery store had a CRAZY deal on whole chickens this last weekend. ($.59/lb) I bought four and decided to get a head start on my Fall/Winter cooking. I cooked the chickens and shredded the meat, then set out to make lots of stock!

For the chickens, I just place them in a large stock pot with water and a little salt. I cooked them over Medium-High for about 1 hour. Allow them to cool in the pot for about 30 minutes. This makes the meat really moist!

Do not dump the water, but remove the chickens and let them cool. I cooked 3 whole chickens and shredded the meat.

Portioned into freezer bags for winter soup...enough for 4 pots!

Skim the broth in the pots and add more water if desired. Chop two stalks of celery and two carrots per pot. No need to peel the carrots and keep the tops on the celery! Add half an onion, 2-3 bay leaves and about 1 TBS of peppercorns. I made two pots.

Add in the bones from the chickens and turn on the hot tub! Cook over Medium High for at least one hour....I cooked mine for 1 1/2 hours. Allow to cool before placing into containers.

I strain mine over a mesh strainer to remove all the peppercorns and such.

I like to put mine in a few different sized containers depending on what I will be using it for. I got 4- 5 cup containers, 6- 2 1/2 cup containers and 1- 6 cup container. That's a lot of soup! Thank goodness for the deep freeze :)