Guest Post: Oven Fried Chicken

Today's post is a brief review from a long-time family friend, Glenda. She's been following our blog, and gives us feedback frequently about favorite BCC recipes. Thanks, Glenda, for your love and support!


Oven-Fried Chicken (from p. 284 of the BCC): It is always really good and fall-of-the-bone tender.  I make it often, with mashed potatoes and veggies. I even got a kiss on the cheek from Brandon for it! Have to add though, it is nothing like fried, but definitely roasted!

 

Guest Post: For Wes' Sake

Today's post is brought to you by our friend, Wendy Sult, who ordered her 1976 ed. of the BCC after she started reading our blog! Thanks, Wendy, for joining us in this adventure!

In keeping with the theme of the blog, I could easily call this entry "For Wes' Sake."  Per Wes, he had eaten nothing but junk for the better part of five days (in my defense, the Fair was in town!), so I decided to add a Betty Crocker recipe to the meal plan for the week.  Me being me, I scanned the cookbook for the simplest, lowest-risk dish I could find and there on page 306 I found it - Breast of Chicken on Rice. What could be complicated or scary about that?  I tend to like recipes with five ingredients or less. This particular one had six, so I omitted the mushrooms to make it easier.
Who am I kidding?  I hate mushrooms and those babies had to go!  Anyway, moving on...

To make this recipe even more attractive, I noticed that all I really had to do was mix a bunch of ingredients together, pour it in the dish, stick the chicken on top, and pour a little more.  That's it. Voila!  Call me Betty Crocker!  

Okay, that may be going a bit far, but the truth is that the recipe is a "minimum input, maximum output" kind of dish.  It was excellent comfort food that smelled amazing baking in the oven.  We paired it with a recipe from the pages of the Diana Chandler Cookbook - Green Bean Supreme (if you aren't familiar with it, that must change, pronto!) and some sliced apples.  

Excuse the picture of the partially empty baking dish.  SOMEONE, who shall remain nameless, was hungry. :-)

All joking aside, I do tend to make new dishes from time to time.  Most are fine for a one-time thing, but I rarely find one that I want to keep using. They seem to be lacking flavor and I am just not kitchen savvy enough to figure out how to fix it.  Wes insisted that this one must go in our reciperotation.  Yes, it was that good.  The only thing I would change is the amount of rice used.  I would beef that up a bit and we would be set.  What can I say?  My man loves rice.


Looking forward to another rendezvous with Betty's recipes soon...

Tasty dishes and talking dogs

Chicken Cacciatore (from p. 284 of the BCC): As the book declares, it is a great family favorite! Lots of great flavors and colors together... The recipe recommends serving it over rice or spaghetti, so we decided on rice today. Mom used her own garden-fresh tomatoes and green peppers, but decided to leave out the mushrooms this time. It is basically chicken in a tomato-based sauce that includes the above-mentioned ingredients, plus garlic, onion, and oregano (mmmmm, who can resist oregano!). 

 When I asked Dad for a critique, he just said, "Tasty!" with a nod and smile between bites. I said that wasn't really enough verbal response to write a blog about it, and Beau (our dog) must have overheard that, because he suddenly had plenty to say.

Beau is our faithful old house pet who behaves very much like a person, and who likes to keep us company at the table (he is a wonderful companion). If he is patient and very good, he might get a little spoonful of "people food" mixed in his bowl too, after we finish our meal.

But today he reached his nose up to the edge of the table and sniffed and sniffed, apparently enjoying the smells he smelled. Then he stalked back and forth from one of our laps to the other, breathing and wheezing louder and louder, and nudging us as though he was afraid we would forget to save him a taste.

Finally, Mom gave him a bite in his bowl, which he savored and then ran back to the table looking for more. We tried to tell him that we were finished and there was no more for him, but he was not convinced. He still smelled those smells, and they were making him crazy enough to demand more.

Barking ensued, which is not a common practice for the old gentleman. But he was rather insistent and in earnest as he barked and moaned and huffed noisily and pitifully at Dad, then Mom, then me. I think he was actually trying to use Dad's old trick on us: "Tasty? Well, I think it was tasty, but I can't be sure from the tiny morsel I was given. I may need more to be able to tell you for certain how tasty it was!"