Thai Pizza with Sriracha Chicken

First things first, thoughts and prayers for all families affected by the storms. My heart aches at the images.  I know we'll soon have many opportunities to help and support those that have lost so much.

Second things second, the suspense of what Kate Middleton's dress will look like will finally be over. Whew.

Third things third, ummm, wow.  My blog had  6500 visits and 9500 pageviews over the past two days just from a facebook link to my cookie dough cheesecake.  It's so completely unprecedented and off the chart for my blog, that I'd love to know what's linking to me on facebook.  Hint, hint, if you happened to come over from there...just saying is all. :)

Fourth things fourth, I made pizza.  Kind of anticlimactic I know. Even more anticlimactic, is that I didn't technically "make" anything in the pizza. I bought all of the ingredients and "composed" them.  Sandra Lee would be so proud. 

It all started with this little package I found.  Right next to Brooklyn's doggie day care is a Fresh and Easy Market.  Always a sucker for a new grocery store, I had to give it a try...it was so convenient.  Oh what a little treat of a store it was....kind of like a mini grocery, but with Trader Joe type fresh produce and sauces.  I saw this premade crust and thought "what the heck"--I usually make my own dough, but for $1.49, how can you not try right?  Unbelievable.  I never thought there would be a real difference between homemade and storebought dough, but wow.  I must be a really bad dough maker because my dough is always slightly bread like, and this dough made a crust that was crisp at the edges and so chewy...like that perfect NY pizza.  Sorry Chicago pizza fans but I can't live in NY for ten years without developing a die hard love for NY pizza.  It's the best in whole wide world.  Universe even.  And this pizza dough almost makes you think you can create a similar pizza.  That is until I went all California pizza style on it.

There was an article a while back on how salsa had finally surpassed ketchup as the most popular condiment.  And then there was a more recent article on how Sriracha is quickly gaining ground on salsa.  I say, why can't they all win?  For this pizza though, only Sriracha will work. 

Thai pizza is usually known for it's peanutty flavor--I used a storebought peanut sauce to top the crust but a homemade would be phenomenal as well...if one has the foresight to make it and have some ready.  Then I just topped with one cooked chicken breast slathered with Sriracha, some mozarella and green onions. 

Once the pizza comes out of the oven, top with some fresh cilantro and chopped peanuts.    And if you aren't a fan of sriracha's garlicky spice, you could mix a bit peanut sauce into the chicken prior to adding it to the crust.  With premade crust, this truly couldn't be easier and it tastes just like the restaurant pizza...with a sriracha kick.  It's addictive really.

Thai Pizza Chicken With Sriracha

1 premade pizza dough (1 lb)
1 large chicken breast
Sriracha sauce
1/3 cup peanut sauce--bottled or homemade
1 1/2 cups shredded mozerella
1/4 cup sliced green onions
chopped cilantro
1/4 cup chopped peanuts

• Let dough sit at room temperature while you prepare the chicken
• Preheat oven to 400 degrees
• Meanwhile, butterfly chicken or pound thin and bake for 10-15 minutes until cooked through.  Remove from oven and increas heat to 425
• Slice chicken and mix in sriracha to your personal taste preference
• Hand stretch dough to 1/8th inch thickness, spread peanut sauce to 1/4 inch of the edges
• Top with chicken, mozarella and green onions
• Bake for 10-12 minutes or until cheese is melted
• Remove from oven and top with chopped cilantro and peanuts.



Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Cheesecake Cups

It was inevitable right?  Back to work means less cooking and sometimes forgetting that I have a blog.  That being said, it was a phenomenal first week of touring the company's properties on and off The Strip, being treated to lunches at some pretty fab restaurants on the properties and of course, beginning the training.  I'm pretty excited to be exposed to the most mature PMO I've ever seen....process and project lifecycle methodologies defined and practiced= wooohoooo!

Brooklyn is thrilled with her doggie day camp and comes home more exhausted than me...so it's been cereal, cereal and more cereal for dinner.  Needless to say, I was thrilled to get back into the kitchen this weekend.  Since sis was cooking Easter dinner, I covered dessert. This particular recipe embraces two dessert favorites: cheesecake and chocolate chip cookie dough.  Cookie dough is dessert right?

Nope.  I did not make homemade cookie dough. Why would I when storebought cookie dough is so convenient and tasty?

Nope, I did not make my own shortbread.  Why would I when Walkers is so fabulous?

Love the way the chunks of cookie dough stay soft in the middle.   If you don't fully cover the dough with cheesecake batter, the pieces sticking out bake into a crunchy cookie...also quite tasty....definitely one of my favorite cheesecake recipes! 

Happy Easter--hope yours were especially blessed!

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Cheesecake Cups

Ingredients

1 package shortbread

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter melted

3 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese at room temperature

1 cup sugar

3 eggs

1 cup sour cream 

1 & 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 package refrigerated chocolate chip cookie dough

mini chocolate chips

24 muffin papers

Directions:

Line muffin pans with papers

In a small food processor, pulse enough Shortbread to make 1/2 cup of crumbs.  Add butter and pulse until crumbs are moistened

Press crumbs into the bottom of muffin papers

In a mixing bowl, beat cream cheese, sugar until smooth.

Add eggs and beat until combined.

Add sour cream and vanilla, beat until well blended.

Spoon batter into muffin tins, filling to almost halfway

Cut up cookie dough into small pieces and sprinkle into each muffin cup

Fill cups with remaining batter and completely covering dough

Sprinkle tops with mini chocolate chips 

Bake at 350F for 9 minutes  and reduce heat to 325 and bake additional 9 minutes until just set

Turn off heat, crack door open and allow cheesecakes to cool in oven for 1 hour 

Remove from oven and refrigerate overnight

Top with sour cream mixture (1/2 cup sour cream, 1/4 cup sugar and 1 tsp vanilla) if desired

Friendship Bread by Darien Gee and Chocolate Chip Pancakes

Curious about the post title? They do go together, trust me for a moment.

Rewind here a few weeks...I'd just arrived back in Denver after a 12 hour drive.  I opened my patio door, and there, waiting oh so patiently for me, was a familiar looking box.  My heart did a little leap of joy...I knew that box.  Periodically Random House sends me advance copies of books for our book club.  (Sadly, having just moved out here to Las Vegas, I need to find another book club but that's a different story.)  Twelve hour drive, a crate full of one month's worth of mail, even two suitcases full of laundry and I tore into that box like a madwoman.  You have to be pretty exciting to preempt laundry in this house.

The book I received is Friendship Bread by Darien Gee...you know how much I love any book centered around food.   I'm not going to lie to you though, I was just as fascinated by the stickie on the book...had Random House's marketing department really written out personal notes on stickies for all of the books? One hour later I forced myself to put the book down, take off my coat and go to bed. 

I could write a recap of the book, but so many other sites, like Amazon, will do that much better. I'll just say that once my packing was complete and my stuff was on it's way out here to Vegas, I read the book cover to cover in one sitting.  Girlfriends, tragedy, triumph,small town life, family relationships...it's all in there. It's one of those 'fill the bathtub with lots of bubbles and read a book' kind of books. And of course, there's the friendship bread within..originally passed out with a little stickie stating "I hope you like it." Ah Random House--you so clever.

I received friendship bread once and truthfully, didn't know what to do with it after a few loaves of the cinnamony treat.  Who knew there were endless variations of bread or even other deliciousness to make with the starter?  When one of the characters started making brownies with the starter, I swear I would have unpacked my boxes to to find my baking pans if I'd had some starter.  It makes sense really--it's similar in concept to a sourdough starter and you can make pancakes and all kinds of goodies with that.   The book even has a website with an entire webpage filled with endless foods to make with the starter....Girl Scout Samoa or Tagalong bread, Oreo and Cream bread,  Biscotti, Cinnamon Rolls, Cornbread, Pancakes, Brownies and EVEN cake pops...oh my.  Check out the super duper long list of recipes in the recipe box on the Friendship Bread Kitchen site.


So starter in hand, lazy morning before starting my new job next Monday...I chose pancakes for my first friendship bread adventure.

Strawberries are in season...why not right?  Sliced thin with a bit of sugar (I used dried agave nectar) -it's kind of like having strawberry shortcake for breakfast.

That is unless you up the ante by adding chocolate chips to your pancakes. Then it's like chocolate covered strawberries and shortcake for breakfast.  Or dessert. I have to say, I'm a big fan of friendship bread starter now.  Thanks Random House! 

And in answer to the inevitable question of what to do with all that extra starter, my answer is--don't make it.  I dumped half the starter on the last day and then only added half the ingredients for the final version.  Much more manageable and while it seems a little wasteful at first, it's really what you do with sourdough starter. 

Chocolate Chip Friendship Pancakes with Fresh Strawberries
adapted from Friendship Bread Kitchen

Ingredients

1 1/2 cup Friendship Bread starter

3/4 cup flour

1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp almond extract
1/4 cup canola oil
1/2 cup milk
Chocolate chips
1 lb strawberries sliced
2-3 tbsp sugar (to taste)

Directions

• Combine sugar and strawberries in bowl, stir well and set aside  to allow sugar to draw out juices (about 30 mins)
• Preheat griddle
• Measure out Friendship Bread Starter into  bowl or 4 cup glass measuring cup.  Add wet ingredients and whisk together.
• Combine flour, salt, baking powder and baking soda in a large mixing bowl.
• Pour wet ingredients into dry ingredients and whisk well.
• Spoon batter onto skillet or a greased griddle.  Sprinkle with chocolate chips
•  Cook until bubbles appear on the surface, then flip and cook until browned on the other side.
• Serve with strawberries

Chicken and Veggie Stuffed Poblanos

I love grilling.  In the days before I moved into my condo in Denver and we had those silly fire regulations against grilling on enclosed patios,  I'd grill year round.  Winter?  Heck yeah--you are outside for a few minutes and no mess in the oven or on the stove.  Summer?  You can cook without heating up the entire house....yes please.   There's just something about that smoky flavor that makes everything better.

I saw these gorgeous poblanos at the market.  I adore a fabulous fried chile relleno, but since I have an aversion to frying in my place, I leave that great chile dish for the restaurants.  But that's not to say there aren't other chile dishes.  I opted to char these beauties and then stuff them with whatever grillable item I could find in my fridge...zucchini and chickie.

Stuffed peppers look like a lot more work than they are.  I heated the grill for the chicken and threw on the zucchini and poblanos as well.  Then it's just a bit of chopping and sauteeing before you assemble and pop these into the oven.  If you are a pepper fan, it's a great way to clean out veggies from the fridge and would make a great vegetarion dish as well.  Corn on the cob charred on the grill would be even better than the frozen corn I used,  I just didn't happen to have any.

I love this chipotle salsa from TJs and it was perfect for this dish.  Some salsas are a bit vinegary and great with chips, but not always the tastiest in dishes.  This salsa is almost like a chipotle sauce...I added 1/2 a cup and loved the flavor it added but I think these would have been phenomenal even without the salsa.  Enchilada sauce would be great as well.

Just a warning that when you perform this next step, you may begin thinking that you would have made a fabulous surgeon and maybe you missed your true life's calling.   At least I did.

Chicken and Veggie Stuffed Poblanos

1 large chicken breast butterflied and seasoned with blackening spice

1 medium zucchini sliced lengthwise for grilling

4 poblano peppers

1/2 medium onion diced

1/2 to 3/4 cup corn

1/2 cup salsa

Colby Jack cheese, finely shredded

1. Heat grill to medium high and place chicken, poblanos and zucchini on grill
2. Turn poblanos periodically to ensure even charring. This should take about 3-4 minutes per side
3. Remove zucchini and poblanos and leave chicken to cook through
4. Place poblanos in baggie for 5 minutes
5. Dice grilled zucchini
6. Peel skins off of poblanos
7. Remove chicken from grill and set aside; preheat oven to 350
8. Cook onions over medium heat until tender, about 5-7 mins.  Meanwhile prepare peppers by slitting down one side and removing seeds. Place peppers in casserole dish
9. Add corn to the onions and cook additional 5 mins
10. Shred chicken and add chicken and zucchini to onions and corn stir.  Add salsa and remove from heat.
11. Stuff peppers and top with cheese.  Bake for 10-15 mins or until cheese is melted and bubbly.

Tyler Florence's Panzanella

Oh summer produce...I walk the market aisles and giggle with glee.  My current obsession is with Trader Joe's tomatoes...probably because I'm a tomato fiend.  One of my very favorite sandwiches ever is just two slices of ciabatta toasted, thick slices of vine ripened tomatoes, salt, pepper and olive oil.  Sounds a bit plain I'm sure, but it's like eating bruschetta.  I'd take that over a club sandwich any day. 

So while my tomato greediness knows no limits, I knew that panzanella would be the perfect way to kick off the produce season....it's like a tomato sandwich in salad form with a few extra goodies thrown in.  And who better to turn to for a variation than my dream boyfriend Tyler Florence.  I say that, but then I took his variations like celery leaves and anchovies, and left them out.  Maybe this is just "plain 'ole panzanella."  Okay by me.

Cukes are a bit weird to me.  When they are good and not the least bit bitter, I could eat them like candy.  Just a hint of bitterness though and I actually spit them right out...it's like playing the lottery each time.  I've found though that Kirbys or Persian cukes (or any of the smaller variations) tend to be safe.  And I love that extra crispness that they seem to have over regular grocery store cukes.

Ah, and now the bread.  My achilles heel.  What I love about panzanella is that it uses up that leftover and slightly dry bread you bought yesterday on a whim because you couldn't pass up the temptation of that freshly baked smell.   No?  Just me?  Well, I don't deny it. In my house we happened to have a full french loaf that my mother purchased at Sam's which actually has a delightful crust and chewy texture, and the remainder of the garlic ciabatta I picked up. You would think that would be enough yes?

Yeah, not so much.  That same absentmindeness that causes me to lose things all the time, also causes me to completely forget that I put something in the oven once that door is shut.  It's like a magic memory veil--if I don't set the timer I almost never remember there are items baking away in the oven.  I present exhibit A. 

Effort number two was not even photographable because it set off my smoke detectors and I let the water run over the blackened remnants of my former ciabatta while I stood on a stool and fanned the detector.  "Hi neighbors.  My name is Mary and I set off the smoke detectors almost every time I bake.  You'll enjoy living near me."  With two burned batches and no more bread I had to turn to the only bread like item I had left--whole wheat and flax sandwich thins.  Try and imagine that these are big fat crisp croutons instead.

All in all, it wasn't bad.  I'm not going to lie--I missed those big fat ciabatta bread pieces, but luckily, panzanella has such great flavors that as long as the tomatoes are ripe and flavorful, you can make a passable salad. 

Panzanella adapted from Tyler Florence’s Eat This Book

1  loaf of round Tuscan bread, french loaf or ciabatta, cubed
Extra virgin olive oil

2 garlic cloves

Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

Juice of 1/2 a lemon, or as needed

1 tablespoon capers, drained

1 lb cherry or baby heirlooms

1/2 red onion, finely chopped

4 kirby's chopped into 1/2 inch pieces

1/2 bunch of basil, chopped

1. Preheat the oven to 400F. Drizzle bread cubes with about 1/4 cup of olive oil.
2. Spread the bread on a baking sheet and back until the bread begins to brown, about 10 minutes.
3. While the bread is toasting make the dressing: chop garlic and place in large mixing bowl.  Add the lemon juice,  oil, salt, pepper, and stir together.
4. Add  tomatoes, cucumbers, capers, basil, and onion; gently stir. Taste for seasoning.
5. Finally, add the toasted bread and toss it all together.
6. Taste it and season one last time with salt, pepper, and lemon juice.

I Heart Nova Check

My love affair with a certain Nova Check tartan is hardly a secret--I stay pretty faithful to my decades long love affair with this British delightfulness.  Imagine my surprise when my sister surprised me with this beauty for my birthday last week.  I told you she was the best.

Settling In

Tell me again why I moved to another state?  But finally, lease is signed, power is on, boxes are in and 80 percent unpacked.  It's the last 20% that's brutal, because really, it's everything that didn't have a logical home and got put into a pile.  People do this regularly?  Here's a little tidbit about Las Vegas btw...my auto insurance jumped by 35% because....this is my favorite part....there are so many uninsured drivers.  I pay 35% more because others don't pay for auto insurance.  That's all I'll say about that.  It's been a long day--can you tell? 

But all grumpiness aside....yay!  I have a home for the next 6 months and have to say--I am so in love with the kitchen space.  I chose this apt model almost entirely for the kitchen layout. 

The master has these great shelves and window seat.  It was almost enough to tempt me to unpack the boxes of leather bound classics to fill up the shelves.  Almost, but not enough.

All of the kitchen boxes however, will get unpacked.  Kitchen stuff is important. And way messy.

I couldn't wait--all this island space had me heading over to Trader Joes to stock up on groceries...there's some cooking coming up this week.  Boxes schmoxes.

Did I mention how much I love this island?  It's so long, that I've divided it in half...

They say that if you leave your KitchenAid mixer out, you'll use it.  We'll see--I may just end up using this side for countertop dancing sessions instead.  Or not..already have a baking plan for this week...

And gratuitous Chipmunk shot.