Asian Chicken Salad

I hesitate to label things “Asian” because I don’t know any Japanese or other Asian that actually eats this salad. Regardless, I like the Asian-inspired flavors and the crunchy and sweet components of this dish. The weather lately has demanded lots of cool, refreshing salads and this salad does just that.

Ingredients List:

This salad makes two dinner and two lunches for the next day.

• Salad greens (I prefer to use a leafy medley, since those greens are more nutrient dense than any romaine/iceberg combo)
• Sugar snap peas, sliced
• Bean sprouts
• 2 cans mandarin oranges, drained and rinsed
• Almonds
• Wonton strips, cut into strips and fried
• 4 chicken tenderloins

Salad dressing:

• Rice vinegar
• Sesame oil
• Olive oil
• Salt and pepper
• Sesame seeds, toasted
• Dash of sugar

Instructions:

1. Marinate the chicken in salt, pepper, sesame oil, and shoyu for about 15 minutes prior to cooking. Then, in a hot skillet, heat up some olive oil and cook chicken.

2. Combine all salad dressing ingredients. Before adding the sesame seeds, toast them in a pan. This will only take a few seconds, but truly adds great depth of flavor to the salad dressing.

3. Prepare the rest of your ingredients – mandarin oranges, bean sprouts, sliced baby snap peas, and salad greens. Combine in a bowl.

4. In a pan or wok with some vegetable oil, fry the wonton strips. I drizzled these with some sesame oil and shoyu also after frying to get an extra dash of flavor.

5. Add the chicken, almonds, fried wonton strips, and salad dressing to your salad and eat up!

The Boyfriend Rates It: 4.o

I have always loved “Asian” inspired salads. They are fresh, crunchy and citrus-y. The only thing that could make this salad any better would be fresh mandarins.

Happy Hour: Buffalo Chicken Dip

The AKA for this dip is crack dip. It is terrible for you. You shouldn’t tell anyone the ingredient list. It will clog your intestines. But. It is so.worth.it. Hence, crack dip. You may mean to only “taste” it, but then you keep coming back for more and more. Terrible. Delicious.

Boyfriend’s sister is the one who shared this recipe with me. She made it as an appetizer for Thanksgiving and then left a bunch of ingredients in my fridge. Since boyfriend attacked this dip at Thanksgiving a few months ago, he has nagged me to make it for him for happy hour. Mistake. We demolished it. Thanks a lot, Deanna.

The ingredient list is nothing to make you feel good about your New Year’s resolution, but it is a perfect dip for Superbowl!

Ingredient List:
8 oz. cream cheese
1/4 cup blue cheese dressing
1/4 cup ranch dressing
1/2 cup buffalo sauce (I used Frank’s hot sauce)
1/2 cup shredded mozzarella
1 cup shredded, cooked chicken

Directions:

1. In a large bowl, combine all the ingredients and mix well.

2. In a small bakng dish, about 8×8, pour ingredients. Bake at 350 degrees for 15-20 minutes until hot and bubbly.

3. Serve with chips. Done!

Wasn’t that the easiest thing ever? Now, go indulge.

The Boyfriend Rates It:4

I don’t really understand why this is so good, even knowing the crappy ingredients that go into it. But it just is. Tangy and melted blue and cream cheese, spicy vinegary buffalo sauce with little bits of chicken…mmmmmm. Just dip away with Triscuits and you have an awesome Super Bowl snack.

Mushroom, Onion, and Chicken Pizza

This recipe is definitely a step up from Pizza Hut. And don’t get me wrong, I love a greasy, cheesy pepperoni pizza every now and then. But this is a pizza of its own style — one of those fancy pizzas with a garlic cream sauce, caramelized onions, and mushrooms. I got the recipe from Budget Bytes. As that blog author writes, it is a meal of love. If you home make the pizza dough the same day, prepare for a long night/next day of waiting. This recipe will take forever. Luckily for me, I had a batch of pizza dough leftover in my freezer. When I make things like that (things that are time consuming), I tend to make double batches so that I can also have a back up in the freezer. Whenever I make the double batch, I hate myself. Yet, when I use the freezer batch, I hug myself for being so clever.

Ingredient List:
– Pizza dough

Toppings
– Mushrooms (the more, the merrier in my world)
– 2 onions
– Shredded chicken
– Mozzarella cheese
– Cilantro

Garlic cream sauce
– 2-3 garlic cloves, minced
– 1/2 cup whole milk
– 1 tbsp butter
– Half package (about 4 oz) cream cheese
– Salt & Pepper

Ingredients:

1. Caramelize your onions. I slice 2 onions and cook them in my dutch oven with olive oil, butter, salt, and pepper. This takes roughly half an hour. As it cooks, add water so that the onions don’t stick to the bottom of your pan. Once the onions are almost done, add either a dash of balsamic vinegar or red wine to deglaze your pan and add that touch of sweetness. I always mean to add red wine, but then I end up drinking it instead. Whoops.

2. For the chicken, take a few tenderloins and boil them with salt, onion, and garlic. When cooked, shred.

3. In a large skillet, cook your mushrooms with some minced garlic, salt, and pepper.

4. Now, the garlic cream sauce. I followed the directions on the blog I got this recipe from pretty carefully. I added a few extra cloves of garlic, because I simply can’t resist, and it was a rather garlic-y sauce. I liked it. In a different pan from the mushrooms, take about 1 tbsp butter and cook it with a few cloves of minced garlic. When the butter melts, add the cream cheese, milk, salt and pepper. Whisk together until smooth.

5. Once your onions, mushrooms, chicken, and garlic cream sauce are done, it’s time to assemble your pizza! Spread your dough out into the shape you want. I made mine this mis-shaped rectangle so I could use a cookie sheet covered with aluminum foil to cook it. Spread the garlic cream sauce all over. Spread a generous portion of mozzarella cheese all over. Top with chicken, onions, and mushrooms. Sprinkle cilantro over the top.

6. Bake. If you are using store bought dough, bake according to package instructions. Since I had made this dough at home, I just set my oven to 350 and baked for about 10-15 minutes until the cheese was melted.

7. Serve up your swanky, gourmet pizza! Enjoy with a glass of wine and a side salad of kale, orange, and avocado.

The Boyfriend Rates It: 4.6
I was not in the kitchen at all for the prep of this meal but it seemed so simple to me, yet it was soo delicious. The sweetness of the caramelized onions balanced out well with the earthiness of the mushrooms. And, as a Mexico-gene (fix if its spelled wrong babe) I love anything topped with fresh cilantro.

Extra Note:
One, my boyfriend is super cute. He left that note for me like I would edit it out but it makes me smile, so I decided to leave it. And two, it would actually be Mexicojin. A person from Mexico. Since boyfriend always calls the Spanish work for Japanese,”Japones” (which was an improvement from when he called me “china” – which I am not), I started calling him this.

Kale Salad

Kale is one of the healthiest things that you can these days. It almost is trendy with how many recipes I see for kale this and kale that. But, from what I’ve read, it really is good for you. Read this quick list about all the reasons it is good for you — it is rich in iron, vitamin K, A, C, calcium, and the list really does go on. As Thanksgiving has come and gone but the eating season still lingers through the rest of the year, my diet has officially started to include heavier, fattier foods. Due to this, I am trying to incorporate a few healthy things along the way. One of these such things is this kale salad. With the exception of extra red pepper flakes here and there, a cheese switch, and the exclusion of quinoa, the recipe comes from here.

Ingredient List:
For the salad:
– Kale
– Lemon
– 3 chicken tenders, cooked and shredded
– Ground coriander
– 1 can of garbanzo beans
– 1 cucumber, diced
– 1 container of cherry tomatoes, halved
– Gorgonzola cheese
– Croutons

For the dressing:
– 1 container of plain Greek yogurt
– 2 tbsp champagne vinegar
– Olive oil
– Mint
– Salt, pepper, red pepper flakes, and a pinch of sugar
– 1 garlic clove

Directions:

1. I have never eaten kale raw before so I was intrigued by this. I have always cooked it and when rinsing it, kale has always seemed tough. From the recipe I mentioned above, I learned that shredding the kale into bite-sized pieces and then squeezing about half a lemon and some salt into it makes kale very palatable. Once you work the kale a little bit and it turns bright green, set aside.

2. For the dressing, combine the yogurt, champagne vinegar, olive oil, garlic, salt, pepper, pinch of sugar, and red pepper flakes in a blender and blend till smooth. Adjust your seasonings as you taste it. I also added the juice of the other half of the lemon since I like the acidic burst and brightness it added.

3. Cook your chicken in a small pan with olive oil, salt, pepper, garlic, and the ground coriander.

4. Drain your garbanzo beans and season with salt, pepper, garlic salt, and red pepper flakes. Dice the cucumbers and halve the cherry tomatoes. Season both with a little bit of salt.

5. Finally, arrange your salad. Obviously, the kale goes at the bottom of the bowl. Then, top with your garbanzo beans, shredded chicken, tomatoes, cucumbers, Gorgonzola cheese, croutons, and the dressing.

Doesn’t just looking at it make you feel healthy? It really is a good-for-you salad with the kale, chicken, garbanzo beans…but it also tasted rather delicious and keeps you full.

The Boyfriend Rates It:5
I loved this salad, and if you follow this blog you know that I’m not a huge fan of them. Apart from the salad being super healthy it also taste amazingly good. The dressing is acid-y and zingy with a touch of heat. There’s a lot going on in the salad, but all the flavors mesh amazingly well together creating a perfect harmony of flavors.

Obachan’s Chicken Adobo

I feel as though many cultures have their own version of chicken adobo. Even my Mexican boyfriend feels as though these flavors are familiar. To me, adobo is one of the simple meals that require almost no attention, makes your home smell delicious, and the juices from it are o.m.g. over gohan (white rice). Perfect for a lazy Sunday dinner.

Boyfriend and I spent four days at my Obaachan and Ojiisan’s house in Napa and ate great food for every meal. When we are there, she always teaches me a few things to make so that I can return home and be a good Japanese girl with some new recipes up my sleeve. Every meal has gohan (which freaks out boyfriend) and miso soup. I love it.

For chicken adobo, there is hardly any explanation required.

Ingredients:
– Chicken (you can really use any cut that you like — deboned and without skin. I think we used chunks of breast and thigh meat)
– Shoyu
– Sugar
– Garlic
– Apple cider vinegar

Directions:
1. Chop up your chicken meat and place in your crockpot.

2. The amount of the above ingredients you use totally depends on the amount of chicken you have. My Obaachan seriously just poured each in — no measurements, just eyeballed everything. We had enough chicken for 8 adults and 5 kids (a lot of family!) so she used several pounds of chicken. For all this meat, she added probably 10-12 whole garlic cloves. Then, start pouring the shoyu and apple cider vinegar so that it at least coats all the chicken, but it is not necessarily drowning in it. As it cooks, more juices will come out so you aren’t filling the crock pot, just coating the meat.

3. Add in about 1-2 teaspoons of sugar, 1-2 teaspoons of dashi and let the chicken cook on medium for several hours.

4. As the chicken cooks, taste the juices and adjust with shoyu, vinegar, and sugar to your liking. I also commonly see people cook adobo with a bay leaf if you want to include that flavor.

5. The chicken is done once all the meat is white and it breaks apart easily — again, depending on how much you cook, this time will greatly vary.

6. Serve with gohan and be sure to pour lots of the adobo juices on your rice! Since I was at Obachan’s, of course we ate this with miso soup also!

The Boyfriend Rates It:5
This is a very simple dish (not to take away from the many trials I’m sure it took Obaachan to get it just right), so there’s not much to say except that the chicken was full of flavor and just about melted in you mouth and the rice was cooked to perfection.