versitility
Hello everyone.
I’ve mentioned my food crisis here before. I move out in less than two weeks, and have tons of meat in my freezer. And tons of leftovers in my refrigerator. There’s nothing worse than wasted food, in my opinion. So, what oh what to do?
Well, in an effort to put the kibosh on my chicken leftovers, I improvised some “chicken salad.” It isn’t really chicken salad because it doesn’t involve cups of mayo and other such things. I’d argue this was much, much better as a result.
"chicken salad"
I didn’t really keep track of proportions or how much of what ingredients I was using (I was rushing out the door to the library) but I scooped in SOME mayo, lots of whole grain mustard (I use Maille; I find it’s the best), and like two or three sprigs of fresh thyme. I chopped up a leftover chicken thigh and combined everything in a bowl. I have about half left over for today, and I’m thinking about putting some cheese on the sandwich. It’d be good with pesto, too.
See? Leftovers can be so useful….
i have discovered the virtue of turmeric.
Hello everyone.
Ah, yes. Turmeric has quickly become my go-to spice of choice. It lends a saffron-yellow color to the dish with the added bonus of FLAVOR. No, saffron does not have flavor. It is an aromatic spice typically used for coloring. It–like lobster–is indicative of luxury, and lacks much else. (I only mention that about saffron because I have come across people who truly believe it has a taste. I taste nothing.) Anyway, turmeric is used frequently in South Asian and Middle Eastern cuisines, both of which I happen to be very fond of.
Tonight I revamped a navy bean soup I made once upon a time. It’s been floating around in my freezer for…oh, perhaps a month and a half, maybe two months. Needless to say it began to collect quite a bit of ice. So, what to do with an iced-over soup?
Dump it into a sauce pan, and throw tons of things into it. Make it new again. Give it back what it once had: flavor.
And that is what I did. This started out as a pretty plain soup consisting of navy beans, onions, a little garlic, a bay leaf, and a variety of dried herbs.
spicy soupy goodness
To it, I added some leftover chicken, 1/2 tsp – 3/4 tsp of turmeric, 1/2 tsp-3/4 tsp of tobasco sauce, the juice of half a lemon, 1 chopped leek, 1 chopped carrot, some chopped fresh parsley, and some chopped fresh thyme. I let it simmer over medium-low heat for about 15 minutes until the carrots and the already cooked chicken were quite tender. For what was once a hunk of ice and beans, it tasted damn good.
Experiment with your leftovers! What bad could possibly come of it?
