recipes

Salad Of Endive & Chili Chicken

 

Salad Of Endive & Chili Chicken

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This was such a pleasant salad to enjoy early in the day.
The colors, flavors and lightness of its ingredients brightened the rest of my day and gave me a wonderful, guilt-free lunch. (I am still working on losing some of the many pounds I added while in Argentina.
So far it’s going well, 13 lbs in about one month, while always eating good and plenty. 🙂
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Bon Appétit !   Life is Good !
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Salad Of Endive & Chili Chicken

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Salad Of Endive & Chili Chicken

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Salad Of Endive & Chili Chicken

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Salad Of Endive & Chili Chicken

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Preparation :
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P.S.
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This dish is part of my upcoming meal plan –
“HANS’ LIGHTER, HEALTHIER COMFORT FOOD”  –  MONTH TWO 
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Click here for 
“HANS’ LIGHTER, HEALTHIER COMFORT FOOD”  –  MONTH ONE

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Congee With Mushroom, Carrot & Egg

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Congee With Mushroom, Carrot & Egg

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“Congee With Mushrooms, Carrots & Egg (Chinese Rice porridge)
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Excerpt from a previous post of  Congee  on ChefsOpinion :
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” Rice Porridge –
The first thing that comes to mind is probably baby food or hospital gruff.
Most folks would never think of ordering it from a menu in a restaurant, much less wake up and crave it for breakfast, if they hadn’t tasted or at least seen it before.

Now, let’s try again :
Congee. Lúgaw. Chok. Xifan. Juk. Okayu.
OK now, that’s better  🙂

Sounds more interesting and exotic? These are just a few names given to rice porridge around the world. If there is a country or region which traditionally eats rice, then there is some form of rice porridge eaten.
Congee can be enjoyed as breakfast, snack, lunch or dinner. Congee most often contains rice, but other grains can be used.
Ideally, it is made with strong, tasty stock that infuses great taste and debt into the dish. But from there on, let your fantasy run wild. Congee can be made with seafood, meat, vegetables or a combination thereof.
Then there are the toppings – Pickled vegetables, fried shallots, sliced scallions, any mushroom, crisp fried garlic, dried shrimps, 100-year eggs, cilantro, etc, etc.
If you like it, put it on.
Below is a version I made on Sunday for breakfast. The texture is more like a Filipino Lugaw, with the rice VERY soft but still keeping its shape. .
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Bon Appétit !   Life is Good !
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Click here for  Congee With Smoked Pigs Tails & Vegetables  on  ChefsOpinion
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Congee With Mushrooms, Carrot & Egg

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Congee With Mushrooms, Carrot & Egg

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Congee With Mushrooms, Carrot & Egg

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Congee With Mushrooms, Carrot & Egg

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Preparation :
To read instructions, hover over pictures
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Banana And Cranberry Salad With Homemade Sugar-Free Banana Ice Cream

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Banana And Cranberry Salad With Homemade Sugar-Free Banana Ice Cream

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If you are prepared, life (cooking) is easy ! 🙂
I usually have some sort of frozen dessert in my freezer for my (too frequently happening) sweets-craving-attacks.
More often than not, it’s some sort of frozen banana dessert, as it was this afternoon. I always have fresh bananas and dried cranberries in my cupboard, so this dish was an easy decision, and thanks to the ice cream in the freezer, a matter of a few minutes to execute 🙂
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Bon Appétit !   Life is Good !
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P.S.
Obviously, there is natural fruit sugar in the ice cream and the banana/cranberry salad, but, besides the organic honey, there is no added sugar.
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P.P.S.
The ratios of fructose and glucose are pretty much the same in both fruit and table sugar.
Generally, there’s no advantage to substituting honey for sugar in a diabetes eating plan. Both honey and sugar will affect your blood sugar level. Honey is sweeter than granulated sugar, so you might use  a smaller amount of honey  for sugar in some recipes.
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Click here for  Sugar Free Banana Ice Cream Recipe   on  ChefsOpinion
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Banana And Cranberry Salad With Homemade Sugar-Free Banana Ice Cream

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Banana And Cranberry Salad With Homemade Sugar-Free Banana Ice Cream

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Banana And Cranberry Salad With Homemade Sugar-Free Banana Ice Cream

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Preparation :
To read instructions, hover over pictures
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Cantonese Soy Sauce Chicken ( See Yao Gai ) ( 酱油鸡 )

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Cantonese Soy Sauce Chicken ( See Yao Gai ) ( 酱油鸡 )

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If roast chicken is your favorite chicken dish, it’s probably because you never had the opportunity to taste this marvel of Chinese cuisine. Even if you did taste it, you most likely thought that this is way too complicated and difficult to prepare at home.
Well, here comes ChefsOpinion to the rescue 🙂
I am happy to give you all the info you’ll need to prepare this wonderful, actually simple to prepare, flavor-bomb at home.
Once you see the easy step by step instructions and how few ingredients are required, you will surely ask yourself why you’ve never tried your hands at this before. Enjoy ! 🙂
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Bon Appétit !   Life is Good !
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Cantonese Soy Sauce Chicken ( See Yao Gai ) ( 酱油鸡 )

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Cantonese Soy Sauce Chicken ( See Yao Gai ) ( 酱油鸡 )

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Cantonese Soy Sauce Chicken ( See Yao Gai ) ( 酱油鸡 )

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Cantonese Soy Sauce Chicken ( See Yao Gai ) ( 酱油鸡 )

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note the juiciness of the chicken breast ……..

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Preparation :
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Here is what I did the next day with the leftover chicken and sauce :
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Leftover Soy Chicken

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Snails And Gnocchi In White Wine, Pernod & Mustard Cream

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Snails And Gnocchi In White Wine, Pernod & Mustard Cream

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Snails and Gnocchi, what a wonderful combination.
Add Pernod Ricard, wine, and whole grain mustard, and you have a heavenly dish that is super easy to prepare, looks like a million and tastes like 2 million 🙂
I have created this dish decades ago, and have served it in many restaurants around the World since.
Good, simple food never get’s old 🙂
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Bon Appétit !   Life is Good !
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Gnocchi Recipe:
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Ingredients:
1 lb Russet potatoes,   cooked, peeled, mashed
A/P flour,   sifted – as needed
2 Eggs,  whole, whisked
Kosher salt, to taste
Cayenne pepper, to taste
1 0z Butter
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Method:
Add eggs, seasoning and flour to potatoes, mix lightly until smooth.
Shape into gnocchi.
Make light indentations with a fork.
Cook a sample in simmering salted water. If too soft, add flour. If too dense, add egg.
Cook gnocchi in simmering water until gnocchi float. Remove with slotted spoon into a strainer. Saute in melted butter.
Serves four.
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P.S.
If you are squirmish about snails, replace them with large scallops. This will give you a different, but equally wonderful dish 🙂
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Snails And Gnocchi In White Wine, Pernod & Mustard Cream

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Snails And Gnocchi In White Wine, Pernod & Mustard Cream

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Snails And Gnocchi In White Wine, Pernod & Mustard Cream

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Preparation :
To read instructions, hover over pictures
To enlarge pictures and read instructions, click on pictures
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Buttermilk Pancake With Merlot-Poached Pears And Merlot Cream

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Buttermilk Pancake With Merlot-Poached Pears And Merlot Cream

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While I have used the traditional ingredients for this pancake, I have changed the ratio of eggs to flour considerably. This resulted in what I think is a “real” pancake, by which I mean it is a cake, baked in a pan 🙂 If you look at the close-up of the cut pancake, you can clearly see the texture of a cake, not a traditional pancake, which is much lighter and fluffier in texture and therefore tends to deflate very quickly after being removed from the heat. This one you see here did not deflate and maintained the same light texture after it had cooled down and spent the night (half-eaten) in the fridge.
Makes you wonder why one goes through the trouble of making a complicated cake………. 🙂 ?
I know, I know, many folks enjoy baking and love to prepare cake in any form, shape, and taste – but if you don’t, (me), this easy recipe might just be the solution you’ve been looking for to have your pancake cake and eat it too 🙂
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Bon Appétit !   Life is Good !
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Buttermilk Pancake With Merlot-Poached Pears And Merlot Cream

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Buttermilk Pancake With Merlot-Poached Pears And Merlot Cream

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Buttermilk Pancake With Merlot-Poached Pears And Merlot Cream

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Buttermilk Pancake With Merlot-Poached Pears And Merlot Cream

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Buttermilk Pancake With Merlot-Poached Pears And Merlot Cream

Buttermilk Pancake With Merlot-Poached Pears And Merlot Cream

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Preparation :
To read instructions, hover over pictures
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Hoisin Chicken With Sun-Dried Tomato Pasta And Cherry Bomb Peppers

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Hoisin Chicken With Sun-Dried Tomato Pasta And Cherry Bomb Peppers

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First of all – calm down, don’t be scared, hold your horses, don’t panic !
Despite their vicious name, “cherry bomb peppers” (sometimes just called “cherry peppers”), are not very hot at all, registering at just 2500 to 5000 Scoville heat units (SHU). (Think jalapeno). They can be red, yellow or green and, depending on the pickling marinade, the original heat-level is sometimes brought down to a mild, tasteful flavor which adds a welcome light kick (the kick of a lady, not the kick of a mule) to some otherwise overly sweet and/or mild dishes, without burning your mouth to a crisp.
And of course, as I have mentioned many times, pls adjust the recipe according to the preference of the folks you serve your food to, so if you do not enjoy chilies, just omit them 🙂
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Bon Appétit !   Life is Good !
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Hoisin Chicken With Sun-Dried Tomato Pasta And Cherry Bomb Peppers

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Hoisin Chicken With Sun-Dried Tomato Pasta And Cherry Bomb Peppers

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Hoisin Chicken With Sun-Dried Tomato Pasta And Cherry Bomb Peppers

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Hoisin Chicken With Sun-Dried Tomato Pasta And Cherry Bomb Peppers

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Hoisin Chicken With Sun-Dried Tomato Pasta And Cherry Bomb Peppers

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Preparation :
To read instructions, hover over pictures
To enlarge pictures and read instructions, click on pictures
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Plasas & Foo Foo (West African Chicken, Spinach, Tomato and Peanut Stew With Cassava)

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Plasas & Foo Foo (West African Chicken, Spinach, Tomato and Peanut Stew With Cassava)

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There is not much one can say about Plasas – essentially, it is a simple chicken stew. On the other hand, it is without a doubt one of the most delicious chicken dishes anywhere.
Plasas will go well with any starch, but in my opinion, it goes especially well with this version of foo foo, which is my absolute favorite:
Pounded or riced cassava, cayenne, salt, garlic and a sinful amount of butter (no liquid added here)
This fat /calorie bomb is of course not the most healthy dish if consumed in large quantities or if consumed often, but once in a while, a moderate quantity of foo foo will surely make you strong and pretty ………… 🙂
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Bon Appétit !   Life is Good !
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Click here to read all about  Foo Foo
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Click here to read all about  Plasas
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Click here to read all about the many names, cooking methods and recipes for Cassava, also called Yam, Maniok, TarulTapioka, Ube, Chupri Alu, and many others, ( but NOT the American kind called “Yam”, which is a sweet potato, unrelated to Cassava)
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Plasas & Foo Foo (West African Chicken, Spinach, Tomato and Peanut Stew With Cassava)

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Plasas & Foo Foo (West African Chicken, Spinach, Tomato and Peanut Stew With Cassava)

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Foo Foo

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Plasas & Foo Foo (West African Chicken, Spinach, Tomato and Peanut Stew With Cassava)

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Plasas & Foo Foo (West African Chicken, Spinach, Tomato and Peanut Stew With Cassava)

 

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Preparation :
To read instructions, hover over pictures
To enlarge pictures and read instructions, click on pictures
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Vol Au Vent Aux Blancs De Poulet

Vol Au Vent Aux Blancs De Poulet

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About a week ago I read in a “respected” magazine that one should NEVER eat Sauce Hollandaise or one of its derivatives in a restaurant because hollandaise is NEVER made fresh to order, but rather before the service and then kept warm during the whole service.
What a load of crap !!! 😦
Admittedly, some restaurants may do this, but many restaurants who have one or two dishes with hollandaise on the menu will not waste the ingredients if there is no order for a particular service. It takes a professional cook or chef maybe 1 or 2 minutes to produce 2 portions of fresh hollandaise, so to do it “a la minute” (to order) is no problem at all.
When I was an apprentice and later as a young cook, we ALWAYS made hollandaise a la minute during a la carte service.
– The moral of this? always double-check before you take a story/advise for granted. 🙂
– Also, hollandaise is one of the easiest and quickest sauces to prepare.
– Have I mentioned that Sauce Hollandaise is one of the French mother sauces?
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When I prepare a whole roasted whole chicken for Bella and myself, I usually eat both tights and all the scraps from the bones, including the neck, wings, and back, while Madam enjoys the two breasts (one per day). However, yesterday she kept begging for food while the chicken was still a while before being done, so I gave her a full portion of her own food (usually she gets only half that amount because she’ll eat some of my food later).
After I ate my usual part of the chicken, I removed all the skin and bones from the breasts, submerged it in salted water and kept it in the fridge until today, when I used it to prepare this Vol Au Vent Aux Blancs De Poulet.
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P.S.
Please note that both mushrooms and sauce hollandaise are optional in this classic dish.
P.P.S.
Nowadays, in most commercial venues, because of safety issues, hollandaise is made from powder or ready-made from a can, which eliminates the danger of eggs served at unsafe temperatures.
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Bon Appétit !   Life is Good !
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Vol Au Vent Aux Blancs De Poulet

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Vol Au Vent Aux Blancs De Poulet

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Vol Au Vent Aux Blancs De Poulet

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Preparation :
To read instructions, hover over pictures
To enlarge pictures and read instructions, click on pictures
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Smithy’s Beef Rib Soup With Spinach And Pasta (Rinder Suppe Von Der Rippe, Mit Spinat Und Pasta)

Smithy’s Beef Rib Soup With Spinach And Pasta (Rinder Suppe Von Der Rippe Mit Spinat Und Pasta)

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When all else fails, this soup will make you feel better………(Just ask Smithy)  🙂
If you prefer, replace the linguini with any type of pasta, potatoes, or rice.
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P.S.
If you don’t like to use chopsticks, break the linguini (or any other type of long pasta) into small pieces before cooking.
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Bon Appétit !   Life is Good !
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Smithy’s Beef Rib Soup With Spinach And Pasta (Rinder Suppe Von Der Rippe Mit Spinat Und Pasta)

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to plate, add 1/2 of ea pasta, spinach and beef to a large soup plate, add beef broth

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Smithy’s Beef Rib Soup With Spinach And Pasta (Rinder Suppe Von Der Rippe Mit Spinat Und Pasta)

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Smithy’s Beef Rib Soup With Spinach And Pasta (Rinder Suppe Von Der Rippe Mit Spinat Und Pasta)

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Preparation :
To read instructions, hover over pictures
To enlarge pictures and read instructions, click on pictures
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