More hits from Smitten Kitchen!

Another couple hits from Deb at Smitten Kitchen!  Just can't seem to go wrong with her recipes!

Thursday Menu:  Alex's Chicken and Mushroom Masala, basmati rice, roasted cauliflower, green salad.

We had an ancient bottle of masala.  No matter.  I did it with chicken thighs, as per Deb's suggestion. Super easy, weeknight dinner, came together pretty well.  The mushrooms were scrumptious.  Button mushrooms were great in this dish.Made great work leftovers, as well.

Saturday Menu:  One-Pan Farro with tomatoes, sausages, green salad.
The One-pot Farro, a riff of Martha Stewart's One-pot pasta dish, was a revelation.  Tasted a lot like a risotto in texture, but a lot less required babysitting of the pot!  I used the small delicious tomatoes we get at Costco, plus a whole onion, a little garlic, and found I wanted a little extra tomatoey flavor, and ended up adding a couple canned tomatoes toward the end.  It was tricky to get seasoned just right.  But the dish really came together in the last few minutes simmering on the stove.  Yummy!  And no need to saute the onions in advance, or anything.  Super easy!  I am a new farro convert!  Thank goodness I can find it easily in bulk at Big John's PFI.  We had a couple folks over to join us for dinner, and it was definitely company-worthy food.  Hearty, big flavors, and I made a double batch, so there was plenty.

In other kitchen news this week, in light of Zuzu's flu bug, I wanted to make some killer chicken stock, and tried Deb's slow cooker stock using only wings.  Again, she nails it.  The flavor was so perfect-- simple, but deep.  Chickeny, but only in the very best way.  So perfect to do it in the slow cooker.  It just cooked all day, and by the time the kids were in bed, we had this fabulous golden broth.  No eyes on the stove.  Just done.   Definitely provided great flavor for the Chicken Marsala, and now I'm ready to try beef stock.  I bet my favorite short rib recipes would be knock your socks off.

Still trying to figure out just the right format for this blog.  Do I report every meal?  Only hit the highlights?  And when (if ever) to go public?  make announcements that this thing actually exists?  We'll get there.  As with everything, we'll get there.