Pizza

Yes, today I am talking about pizza. 


Pizza

Crust

2 cups of flour

1 ¼ tsp. instant yeast

¼ tsp. salt

¾ cup water

7 and a half tsp. olive oil

Pizza sauce or pasta sauce to cover thoroughly

Any topping – fresh pineapple, ham, pepperoni,

salami, fresh mushrooms, leftover chilli, and any cheese.

Preheat oven to 425° F.

Combine flour, yeast, and salt in a mixing bowl. Warm up water and oil to very warm but not hot. With machine running, slowly pour water and oil into flour mixture. Let the machine work for a couple of minutes. Knead dough on a lightly flour surface for a while until it is soft and elastic. With a rolling pin, roll out the dough on a lightly oiled pizza stone. Cover pizza with pizza/pasta sauce and toppings. 

  

Cook the pizza for about 17 minutes at 425°F. The more toppings there are on a pizza the longer the pizza takes to cook.

When we make pizza, it`s like the whole house gets excited. You can even hear it. You keep telling yourself - it's coming, it's coming. Once the aroma hits, you  think - That's it. I am going into that kitchen and coming out with a piece of pizza. And that is final. Until mother stops you in your tracks and says

"Go sit down or you'll choke." There is no arguing in that statement. Mothers are usually right. 

We love to use leftover chili on our pizza. Here are some pictures of it:








When we use chili, we don`t use tomato sauce on the pizza and usually only cheddar cheese because the flavor is stronger  and sharper. The chili can be just a regular dish of leftovers. I like the chili to be dryer than normal. If the chili is runny, you could add some flour to thicken it up when cooking. It does not matter if you put the chili on cold or hot when you are to put it in the oven. In our chili recipe we cook about 1 pound to 1 and 1/2 pounds of ground beef for the 4 of us. Then we add 1 or 2 cans of tomato soup.  Next I like to add onion powder, chili powder, 1 can of brown beans, and 1 can of kidney beans and my dad loves to add a lot of salsa and A LOT of chili powder. Here is a story about that... 


One time, my dad and the hired man were home alone to fend for themselves for lunch. My brother and I were in school and my mother was somewhere else. So my dad made chili that day. He added some ground beef, way too much hot chili powder, and ALOT of hot salsa and not enough beans. I heard it was so bad that after they "tried" to eat it they had to find something else to eat for lunch. They said the chili was brutal. 


Anyway...
After we eat chili, in the next couple of days one of us usually creates our chili pizza with the leftover chili. For the 4 of us, we usually double the dough recipe to make 2 pizzas, one with the leftover chili and the other with more traditional toppings. On the traditional pizza we add pizza sauce, or if we are out, we add some pasta sauce. It works and tastes all the same. On top of the sauce we may add some fresh fresh pineapple (right from the store (never canned)), ham, salami, pepperoni, fresh mushrooms, and/or red-green-orange-yellow pepper, and sometimes afterward when it is cooked we add fresh tomato slices. For cheeses I have added cheddar, mozzarella, Monterey Jack, Gouda, Feta, Parmesan, and sometimes goat cheese. Try experimenting with different combos of flavor!


I would like to encourage you to email me at jensencooks@hotmail.com. Ask me about my recipes, techniques or to just have a chat! I will try to return your email as soon as possible.

Chicken Pot Pie

Lets use up those left overs! Get enthusiastic about them and let the world know leftovers can taste good! It is about just adding spices or transforming it all.  In this case, we are changing it so much it's not even like leftovers. It is more like hiding the taste to make people eat leftovers without knowing it. To use up chicken or turkey, we use our chicken pot pie recipe. It has never failed us once through all those chickens and turkeys we've eaten over the years. Let's give it a go!

Chicken Pot Pie

1 cup chopped onions

2 tbsp. butter

2 cups water

2 chicken bouillon cubes

3 generous cups potato

2 cups cooked chicken

1 ½ cup carrots

1 cup peas

½ tsp. salt

1/8 tsp. pepper

2 tsp. poultry seasoning

1/3 cup flour

¾ cup milk

1 cup water (optional)

Cook onions in 2 tbsp. of butter until softened. Add 2 cups of water and 2 bouillon cubes. Add potatoes
(if using fresh vegetables add here) and then bring to boil with a lid to cover. Add chopped cooked chicken (if using frozen vegetables add here). Simmer until potatoes are soft. Stir in salt, pepper and poultry seasoning. Whisk together flour and milk. Stir as you add milk mixture. If the stew is too thick add water to thin. While the stew is simmering, prepare your pie crust.

Pastry for Double Crust Pie
(source: Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book )

4 cups flour

1 tsp. salt

1 1/3 cup shortening or lard

12 tbsp. water

Mix together flour and salt. Use a pastry blender to cut in shortening or lard. Once the pieces are about pea size, pour in water tablespoon at a time and mix till in a sticky ball. You can use a machine mixer or by hand. Once you add in the water it is a very quick process to mix it all together.

Roll out about a hand full of dough to reach the size of about a saucer plate. Take a saucer plate and place it down and cut around it with knife or table knife. Take dough circle and place it in one of the tin pot pie plates. Scoop about 1 to 1 ½ cups of stew into chicken pot pie. Cut another circle the same size and place it on top as a cover. Crimp the edge with a fork by pressing into it to seal it. Poke the fork into the center of the covered pot pie to let air out when cooking, and to stop explosions. Repeat process until all dough is gone. Makes about 8 chicken pot pies. Set on cookie sheet to cook at 425° about 15 minutes or until golden brown.

Okay, it may seem like alot, but it goes fast. It is worth the effort for how good these "leftovers" taste. You can use this recipe with turkey too. It is nearly just the same except that it is a different kind of meat all together.

Here is a quick interesting fact about using flour. In the winter the air is dryer, so flour may also be dryer. When the flour is dryer, it will absorb more water so you might have to add a little more water than what the recipe calls for.  My mother says not to worry about this. And like I said - mothers are usually right.

Yes, I did say that leftover taste good. As a matter of fact, I've had cooking that tasted better on the second day or third day of serving it! You probably have too.

When ever you are serving leftovers, be proud of it! It's not every day that you get to eat that same great meal twice or three times in a row! If you are hiding the "leftovers" in the meal, don't say any thing and see if the people you are serving it too say anything. If they haven't said any thing, you have truly perfected the art of serving ( or hiding ) "leftovers". Good luck!!!

Roast Chicken

 Roast Chicken

1 chicken thawed 
(fresh, free run, farm chickens are best)

2 tbsp. olive oil

Sprinkle sage

Sprinkle cumin

Pinch nutmeg

Pinch mild curry powder

Sprinkle onion powder

Sprinkle poultry seasoning

Preheat oven to 425°.

Unwrap chicken from plastic. Rinse the chicken under water – inside and out. Take roasting pot and put 2 tbsp. of olive oil in and spread around equally. Spread seasoning on the chicken. Put in oven at 425° for 15 minutes then turn down oven to 325° and cook until golden brown.    

The fresher the chicken - the better turn out you will have. There is lots more flavor and a different taste in all. Finding the freshest chicken is always the hardest part. You can buy local chickens at a farmers market or food stores. My family sells our garden vegetables and our chickens at the farmers market in Lloydminster.

My family just got our chickens processed at the plant in St. Paul. We don't do it ourselves because it is a lot of work, and it is very disgusting. 


On to the chicken...


Okay - to bake a chicken it not that hard, whether its for Christmas dinner or Sunday night meal. Its just that it can take up alot of time to cook but other wise it's just getting every thing else ready like the potatoes, the vegetables, and the bread dish, whether its buns stuffing or both. My auntie would say "Thats exactly it,  Jensen." I also have no good pictures of the bird itself because dad cut into it before I even had the camera on me. So I took a picture of my brothers plate.


Do not be afraid to cook a big chicken. There's always ways to cook up the left overs some how. I've also read that you can put a whole lemon in the chicken. I like getting a few guide line recipes, then taking it from there. Adding a little bit from each, then my own touch here and there. With this recipe, I took the chicken and rinsed it off in the sink inside and out. Next I just set the bird into the greased roasting pan and sprinkled the seasonings on the chicken, trying to get every where. I  try to set the chicken into the center of the pan but it slipped around and ended up somewhere else in that pan. It doesn't show on the bird where it gets placed so long as it is about in the middle of the oven for the heat. Do not put vegetables in the roasting pan when you cook it. I don't know why, my mother told me to not, mothers are usually right. Keep the lid on the roasting pan so the bird does not dry out. I cooked the chicken until golden brown or until the meat is no longer pink and the drumsticks move easily in their sockets. I always forget to put I on the timer.


So there you have it. You can't wreck meal that badly. If you mess up in preparation, I would say call your mother, or search it on the internet, thats what I do. If you have any questions or anything like that leave them in the comments please.  


P.S.
My next blog will be about how use up your left over chicken!!!