White Chicken Chili

White Chicken Chili a la Cook's Illustrated

This New England winter calls for hearty soups and stews, pot roast and ribs.  It's hard to make low-calorie choices when the weather is cold.  I mean, really, who wants shrimp salad when the thermometer reads 22 degrees F.?  Not me, not you.

I've ventured into--let's not call it diet cooking--but cooking that doesn't break the calorie bank.  It's good, it's tasty, but man it is labor intensive.  We are trying to incorporate more fruits and veggies into our diet and also attempting to eschew processed foods whenever possible.  We are also trying to reduce sodium, yada, yada, well you can see where this is going.

Eating healthy is hard.   The "diet" chicken pot pie I made was delicious but was it ever work!  If I still worked 8:00 - 6:00 (nine to five jobs being a thing of the past) no way could I do this.  When I was in the labor force we ate out twice a week, had chicken breast one night, pork chops another, steak a third and on the weekends I cooked.

Years ago, on a business trip to Wisconsin, our host took us to a restaurant that served white chicken chili.  It was amazing,  and we were hooked.  This particular recipe used loads of sour cream, cheese, and well, the chicken was the only thing low-cal about it.

I discovered a recipe with no cheese and no sour cream in Cook's Illustrated.  Drove to the Dedham Whole Foods to pick up the chicken and an assortment of peppers along with a bunch of cilantro.  The ingredients did not break the bank, another consideration.  Today, I  made the chili.  Ye Gods it was a lot of work, and I used all the bowls, and two Cuisinarts and assorted kitchen tools.  Filled up the dishwasher with prep stuff.  Cooked it up, and tasted.  Not too interesting.  Added last minute ingredients.  Yowza!  This was good.
And we can eat it for two more days.

Here is a link to the recipe

You will surely want to try this.  Some markets may not have poblano and Anaheim peppers, but Whole Foods did.  Love that store.  You will need a food processor.  I used my mini-chopper for the garlic and jalapenos and the big bruiser for the peppers and onions.  Already looking forward to dinner tomorrow.  Oh my! 

Thanksgiving: Taking Sides

From recipematcher.com - the read McCoy

Taking sides.  Nope, not talking about family arguments.  I remember my mom and her brothers arguing politics (2 Dems, 2 Republicans) and my grandma getting more and more nervous and twisting her handkerchief.

The sides I'm taking about are side dishes.  The Boston Globe had a whole food section devoted to them today.  My post yesterday was about a charming little sweet potato side dish that can make a cook's reputation.  Today we're doing, Ta Da!  Green Bean Casserole from Scratch.  And I mean REALLY from scratch, the only processed item being the onion rings, and hell, we just can't do without those, right?
You will use fresh green beans and make your own white sauce and saute your own mushrooms, and everything is 100% delicious. It's even simple if you are a moderately experienced cook.

The recipe is from the November/December 2006 Cook's Illustrated.
Here is the link. Green Bean Casserole from Scratch

It serves 10 to 12 and the leftovers are great.  Sit back and enjoy the compliments.  You deserve them. 

Thanksgiving observations.  It's not stuffing, if it's not inside the bird.  It's dressing.

It's not gravy unless it's thickened with flour, it's sauce.  Let's take our word choices seriously.

Thanksgiving is everyone's favorite holiday because except for the food chores, generally shared, there's not a lot to do.  O.K., vacuum the dining room, etc.  and maybe rent chairs or dishes, but compared to the hoo ha around Christmas, Thanksgiving is a slam dunk.

Last words:  don't ever go to a French restaurant for a traditional American Thanksgiving meal.  They don't understand the genre, so to speak.  I love French foods, but it takes an American cook to do a proper Thanksgiving.

Onward,

Grapeshot

I Knew Her When. . . Sort of

Meg Whitman of Ebay fame is running for governor of California. According to Tina Brown's blog, Meg is an arch conservative. Well, not my zebra, not my zoo.

I actually worked at the same company as Meg many moons ago. She was a divisional president and I was an IT dweeb, so we didn't interact. The company was forever trying to keep a human face (those days are gone forever) and one of the things it did was ask executives (maybe even the rank and file--I don't recall) to bring photos of themselves as a child. Meg's photo was her girlish self with a whopping big fish she had just landed. Cool kid. Cool photo.

One of my colleagues who did interact reported that she had a fantastic stragetic mind. Someone else reported that she was a revolving door for secretaries. Gee. Remember secretaries? How quaint. Maybe she was demanding, as one would expect.

Meg left to work for an internet florist, where she obviously learned a whole lot about net business. The next person to occupy her office had an Oriental rug and a white leather sofa which I promply put into a novel. This divisional president had a hissy fit when we cooked broccoli in the IT microwave. It did stink and we were on the same floor. I never cooked any, but some did. Actually fish in the microwave at lunch time is worse.

Speaking of food, and aren't we always, this week I made Chicken Piccata from Cook's Illustrated and it was a winner. The wonderful chocolate/mocca cookies are gone.

S.O. has a birthday and #2 son is arriving, so we're having a pork roast with creamed spinach, mashed potatoes and gravy, applesauce and for dessert- ta da! Chocolate panna cotta with portwine ice cream.

We ate tiny scoops of port wine ice cream in DC at Poste, and it was incredible. I found a recipe on the web. The ice cream tasted to divine with the dark chocolate. Haven't made panna cotta in ages. So we are in for a feast, and then the leftover pork will naturally be Roast Pork Fried Rice. We're doing all this in lieu of going out.

Have you seen the commercial that asks why spent $40 on a family dinner out when you can eat pizza on the cheap? My question is: where except a fast food establishment can you have a family dinner for $40? Certainly not with wine and tax and tip. Hell, you can barely eat lunch for that.

I submitted a memoir piece to an ezine and have one more submission to make, then everything I've written in the last five years will be out looking for a home. How cool is that?

Off to put the clothes in the dryer. The mundane always calls.

Grapeshot