Blog Archives
Food 101: How To Make Basic Chicken/Turkey Gravy From The Pan
Thanksgiving is around the corner, so that means one thing is on most chef’s minds: turkey. Turkey is quintessential to a Thanksgiving meal, and yet where would it be without the sweet nectar that we know as gravy? That sauce made from pan drippings and spices can take any meat from good to awesome instantly, and it requires minimal effort to make in most cases. There’s a couple of slightly different ways to make it, but they all utilize the same basic ingredients and general preparation once you acquire the aforementioned drippings. Making gravy from scratch is easy and tastes a lot better than jar gravy, so it’s definitely a skill you should keep in your cooking holster.
Quick Recipe: Easy Chipotle Chicken Club
Sandwiches are a magical food. They’re delicious and handy. Yet they come in every variety possible, limited only by your imagination. I consider myself a sandwich connoisseur of sorts and am always crafting new ones for lunch. This one was inspired by one I eat frequently at a local restaurant. I took my own spin on it and was pleased with the results enough to share the recipe.
Chipotle ranch is slowly growing in popularity. It’s nothing new, but it’s certainly hit it big over the past decade thanks to its pairing with sandwiches and onion rings. This particular chicken sandwich is relatively smooth thanks to the addition of french fries, however don’t think that that means it’s bland. Chipotle ranch and cheddar are an awesome combination, and form something with formidable tang, without being too in your face. Your choice of chicken depends on personal preference, but I recommend using breaded cutlets since the breading adds some more flavor. Best of all, this sandwich in general can be made with mostly things lying around the house. Nothing too luxurious. That makes it perfect for throwing together as a quick lunch or even dinner!
Food 101: How To Make Tempura
So we recently covered frying chicken cutlets, and how it’s pretty much the best thing ever. Today we bring you more coverage of fried chicken in the form of tempura, and how to make it. However, this isn’t the traditional fried cutlet I wrote about in my last post; rather this is a bit more exotic, though still delicious in its own right. Chicken tempura is actually closer to a chicken finger than a chicken cutlet. But hey, they’re all great, so who cares? Tempura is delicious, cheap, and the batter is the easiest recipe on Earth to remember. It has three ingredients. I shit you not, three. Since when does anything delicious have only three ingredients?!
Food 101: How To Make Chicken Cutlets
Possibly one of the greatest, most useful foundation blocks of a balanced diet is the mighty chicken cutlet. Hailing from almost all corners of the world, almost every cuisine on the planet features some variation of a breaded cutlet made from chicken, pork, or veal. In America we’ve come to embrace chicken as the one true cutlet in modern times, since chicken is objectively better than other meats in every way, shape, and form. Plus, not only are they fairly easy to make and pretty good for you health-wise if fried in olive oil, but they’re also amazingly versatile and can be used to make a like eight billion different dishes. Seriously, the sky is the limit if you have a steady supply of chicken and breadcrumbs. Everyone on the planet should know how to whip together a quick batch of chicken cutlets, as if it were a rite of passage (and in some Italian households it is, haha). If you were never scolded or shamed into learning how this late in the game, then you’ll be happy to know it’s something that nearly anyone can make.
We Can Do It Better: Chicken Nachos
Confession time: late night half-price appetizers at Applebee’s are a bit of a guilty pleasure for us. Well, maybe not so much a pleasure…it’s something we’re guilty of doing sometimes when it’s starting to get late and we haven’t made dinner yet. We usually get nachos to share and then our own things. In case you hadn’t noticed by now, Erik and I don’t eat beef, so instead of the Chili Cheese Nachos we get the Nachos Nuevos (which are chicken nachos), that used to be their own menu item but aren’t anymore so you have to ask for them special.
In general they’re pretty good. But they can also be rather hit or miss. Sometimes there’s hardly any chicken, sometimes the cheese is barely melted. Worst of all, one time there was literally piles of salt on the chips. The result is that we usually end up regretting our decision, since it results in being thirsty and bloated the rest of the night. Finally we decided that we could do this better on our own. And we did.
The Poor Couple's Food Guide 
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