First of all, you don't have to use black rice. I just happened to see a giant bag of it at Costco and decided to try it. It looks really pretty (if you compare them in your brain to shiny black pebbles instead of bugs) and it tastes sweeter and nuttier than regular white rice. Don't follow the water amounts on the bag though, I noticed that it needed the standard 2 cups water to 1 cup rice just like any other kind, but you do need to cook it for 30 minutes like it says, I didn't add anything fancy to the rice, just salt and butter at the end.
Now to the chicken. I use chicken thighs- they cook quickly and they stay moist no matter what. If you absolutely insist on using chicken breast (because you're a weirdo like my husband) then at least use the breast with the bone and skin still on. I'm yawning just thinking about chicken breast. For this recipe, you want 8-10 chicken thighs (two per person).
Season the thighs first with:
1/4 cup olive oil
1 tablespoon salt
2 teaspoons black pepper
1 heaping tablespoon (or more) of dried herb, I used thyme, but you can do sage or marjoram, or whatever strikes your fancy.
The peach sauce:
2 cups of fresh peaches, peeled, pitted and chopped
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup Muscat wine (Moscato) cheap stuff is fine
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon powdered ginger
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper or white pepper
1 tablespoon of cornstarch diluted in a little bit of water
Bring the ingredients to a boil, then simmer for 30 minutes.
To cook everything in order:
-Preheat the oven to 375 for the chicken.
-Get your peach sauce going on the stove.
-Start the water boiling for the rice.
-Put the seasoned chicken in a roasting pan in the oven.
-Pour your rice into the boiling water, cover, turn down to simmer and set your timer for 30 minutes.
-At the end of that time, pour peach sauce over the top of the chicken and put the chicken back in the oven another 15 minutes.
-After pouring the sauce on the chicken, turn the heat off of the rice and let it sit there covered until the chicken is done.
Serve the chicken with the buttered and salted rice and lots of the pan juices poured over the top.
Obviously you could serve white wine with this, but a cold beer and biscuits would be good too.
I don't know if I should be calling this pretty orange sauce "pesto", there's no Parmesan (or pine nuts) in it. I'm only doing it because it does have nuts in it, and I think it would work for the same applications: slathered on pizza, pasta, baguette, pita chips, sandwiches, grilled meat and so on.
You don't have to be a kitchen over-achiever and grill your own peppers, the ones you buy at the store or deli are just fine. Actually they might even be better because they'll be the nice sweet ones from Italy or Spain. Plus you can sound really pompous when you mention that they're, "Imported from Europe."
You'll need some kind of blender or food processor for this easy sauce/spread.
1 10 ounce jar of roasted red Spanish or Italian peppers, drained
1/2 mounded cup of roasted and salted and Marcona almonds (if you can't get those, regular almonds are fine, but you want them peeled and roasted and if they are unsalted, add more salt to the recipe.) For a thicker dip, use one whole cup.
1 tablespoon FRESH oregano leaves
1/3 cup olive oil
2 tablespoons of your favorite vinegar, I used red wine pomegranate, for the dip use the juice of one lemon instead.
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 smashed garlic clove (a small one)
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1 tablespoon of creme fraiche, or something similar like heavy cream, sour cream or cream cheese (or that Toffuti stuff to keep it vegan)
OR, for the dip version, omit the creme fraiche and add 1/4 cup sun dried tomatoes.
Blend all the ingredients really well in your blending machine of choice, then let it sit in the refrigerator for at least a half hour, or save it in there up to a week (or freeze it for longer). This makes a cereal bowl sized amount which would be plenty for spreading on appetizers, or it would be enough to coat a bowl of buttered pasta for two.
If raw garlic is a bit much for you, you can add dry granulated garlic, about a teaspoon instead. In that case I would add a few extra splashes of vinegar for punch.
Pretty much any combination of root vegetables, roasted simply with salt, pepper and olive oil is going to taste good. This recipe is just one of many combinations you can do, and it's more fun and flavorful than just roasting regular potatoes.
Ingredients:
3 beets
2 parsnips
3 carrots
1 large sweet potato
1 large sweet onion
1 cup fruity white wine or sherry
2 tablespoons dried savory
1 tablespoon dried orange zest (or fresh)
generous sprinkling of celery salt and pepper
1/3 cup olive oil
The first step is to chop the vegetables into roughly equal pieces, I quartered most everything except the large onion which I cut into eighths. I didn't peel anything (well, except the onions) I just scrubbed the skins very well, but you can peel them all if you like. Toss the vegetables in the rest of the ingredients and place in a large roasting pan. Cook at about 400 degrees for somewhere between 45 minutes and one hour, depending on how small you cut everything. Just cook them until you get burnt-edged onions and brown-edged sweet potatoes.
When you get these on the plate, sprinkle them with balsamic vinegar and a few gratings of very sharp cheese.
It's cloudy and chilly, and that means only one thing, I need to stuff myself with comfort food. Nothing is more comforting than roast chicken. Okay, maybe a grilled rib eye is...or bread pudding...or macaroni and cheese...never-mind. The POINT is that hot juicy chicken, and sweet melt-in-your-mouth yams are pretty damned comforting.
Le recipee eez as follows <---say that with le faux French accent, because it makes it fancier.
5 organic chicken drumsticks ( I say 5 because that's what comes in a vacuum sealed package from Costco, one or two more or less really doesn't matter)
4 large yams, or 5 medium sized ones (yams are orange inside, sweet potatoes look almost like regular potatoes inside, although they work fine too)
1/4 cup olive oil
1 cup fruity and/or sweet white wine like a moscato
1 heaping teaspoon dried lavender (I have purchased this at Target, believe it or not, and also Cost Plus)
1 teaspoon dried orange peel, or zest an orange (you can use the juice too, whatever)
1 heaping teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon black pepper
1 heaping teaspoon lavender
1 heaping teaspoon marjoram
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 heaping teaspoon rosemary
Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Wash the yams and cut them in half lengthwise. In a roasting pan (if you don't have one, your big lasagna pan will work fine) arrange your drumsticks and your yams in a single layer, don't stack anything, you want everything snugly laying side by side. You also want the skin side of your yams facing down. Pour the wine over everything, then pour the olive oil over. Next sprinkle all of your seasonings as evenly as possible, concentrating the garlic and rosemary on your chicken. The amounts on the seasonings are just a guideline, feel free to sprinkle on the seasonings right out of the bottle, and just go for it until everything has a nice even dusting!
Roast in the oven for 45 minutes at the 425 degree temperature, then add a 1/3 cup water and tilt the pan a bit so it runs around, then cook another 10 minutes on 300 degrees.
During cooking, the sugars from the yams will ooze out and get really dark colored, don't worry about it, it's not hurting anything. (Although you might have to soak the pan a bit before you wash it.)
When you serve your dish, pour a little of the syrupy glaze from the bottom of the pan over the chicken. You might want to serve a glass of that white wine that you used to cook it with, I mean what the hell are you going to do with that bottle of wine? You don't want to be one of those people who keeps open bottles of wine in their refrigerator for a year. That's just embarrassing. And it's insulting to the winemakers of the world.
P.S. Cost Plus World Market is a good place to get spices at a decent price, as is Trader Joe's and Target (it was weird buying spices at Target, but they have been pretty good so far for the price.)
