Fall Harvest Chicken Pot Pie

For our next episode of Cooking Under Quarantine, we’ll be making another wondering Fall dish — chicken pot pie! This is one of my personal favorites, and this version features festive fall flavors and is wonderful for the cooler weather. The filling is made with roasted root vegetables and tender chicken, with a homemade crust. This dish comes together very easily and is very versatile and adaptable to what you have in your pantry and fridge. So follow along with Chef Jon, and let us know how yours turns out!

Cooking Under Quarantine – Fall Harvest Chicken Pot Pie

Ingredients:

  • 2-3 medium parsnips
  • 2-3 medium carrots
  • 2 sweet potatoes or yams
  • 1 butternut squash, peeled and chopped
  • 2 cups + 2 tablespoons of all-purpose flour
  • 2 tablespoon of sugar
  • Salt
  • Black pepper
  • ​4 cups of chicken stock — can also sub vegetable stock
  • Dried rosemary, 1 tablespoon
  • Poultry seasoning, 2-3 tablespoons — or combo of dried sage and dried thyme
  • Turmeric, 1-2 tablespoons
  • 2 sticks of butter or margarine
  • 1/2 cup ice water
  • 1 lb of boneless, skinless chicken thighs — can use chicken on the bone as well, but will need to cook longer
  • 1 large Spanish or yellow onion
  • Garlic, 6-7 cloves
  • Olive oil

Equipment:

  • Parchment paper
  • 2 baking sheets
  • 1 large skillet or pot
  • Food processor (optional)

Directions:

  1. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit
  2. Season the chicken with olive oil, salt and pepper and bake for 25-30 minutes
  3. Chop the carrots, parsnips, butternut squash, and sweet potatoes into chunks — don’t worry if they’re not all the exact same size. That’s what makes this dish rustic, and they’re also going to be covered with our crust.
  4. Toss the veggies with olive oil, salt, pepper, and rosemary and spread on a parchment lined sheet pan, and roast for 45 minutes to 1 hour
  5. Meanwhile, let’s make the crust — this is a super simple crust, but you can also feel free to use a store-bought pie crust or puff pastry
  6. For the crust: add 2 cups of flour, sugar, butter/margarine, turmeric, half of the poultry seasoning, and 1 teaspoon of salt into the bowl of a food processor. Don’t have a food processor? Feel free to use a hand mixer, pastry cutter, or even 2 forms — just try to resist the urge to use your hands since we want the butter/margarine and the dough to stay cold
  7. Pulse the ingredients together, then start to pour the ice water (ice included) through the feeder (or add a bit at a time if not using food processor) until the dough starts to crawl up the side of the bowl and becomes a loose ball of dough
  8. Empty the dough out onto a floured board or counter and gently form into a ball —resist the urge to knead!
  9. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes, but up to overnight
  10. While the dough is chilling, sauté chop up the onions and garlic, and start to sauce the onion on medium heat with a little bit of olive oil and season with salt and pepper
  11. Once the onions are golden brown, add the garlic and rest of the poultry seasoning and a bit more olive oil
  12. Make a roux in same pan by adding a couple of tablespoons of flour — don’t worry about the onions clumping up. They will loosen up when we add the liquid later on
  13. Let the roux cook until it’s nicely browned but not burnt, then add the chicken (or veggie) stock
  14. Lower the heat to simmer and once the sauce has thickened, add the wine
  15. Let the sauce thicken again until it’s about the consistency of gravy, then add the chicken and roasted veggies
  16. Turn off the heat and  mix well — you want the chicken and veggies to all be coated with the sauce and for all of the ingredients to become one
  17. Take your crust out of the fridge, and roll out your dough to about 1/4 inch thickness or until it’s as big as the pan you’ll be using (I usually use a rectangular pyrex)
  18. Fill your pot pie pan with the chicken-veggie mixture until it’s full but not overflowing because the crust will expand a bit
  19. Layer the crust over the mixture and tuck it into the sides — don’t worry about it being perfect. It will patch itself up a bit in the oven
  20. Make sure to cut a few of slits in top crust to allow for steam to escape or your pie may explode (really!)
  21. Bake at 375 for 45min to 1 hour, or until crust is golden brown and crispy

​Serve hot (if making later freeze or refrigerate the pot pie after putting on the top crust on and bake at same temp for an additional 15 min). Enjoy!

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Cooking Under Quarantine — Curry In A Hurry!

Ingredients:

  • Boneless chicken breast or thighs (Substitutes: tofu), 1-2 lb, cut into chunks
  • Curry paste (green or red), 2-3 heaping tbsps
  • Fish sauce, 1 tbsp
  • Coconut milk, 1 can or 1.5 cups
  • Scallions, 1 bunch
  • Garlic, 2-3 tbsp or to taste
  • Onions, 1-2 small onions or 1 large onion
  • Carrots, 3-4 carrots
  • Bell pepper, 2 bell peppers
  • Potato, 2-3 potatoes
  • Peanut oil (or vegetable or canola — something neutral)
  • Thai chilies, Sambal Olek (chili paste) or other hot pepper (optional)
  • Cilantro (optional)
  • Rice (optional)

Directions:

  1. Chop some potatoes into 1/2 inch pieces, toss with a little bit of oil, salt and pepper, and roast in the oven for 20-25 minutes on 450
  2. While that’s going, cut your chicken into medium-sized chunks — you can also use already sliced chicken or chicken tenders, but I think it’s fun and rustic to DIY
  3. In order to get a good sear on the chicken, you should heat your wok or sauté pan until it’s very hot, then throw the chicken in with a little bit of neutral-flavored oil like canola
  4. While the chicken is browning, mince your garlic, scallions and chop your other veggies (onion, peppers, carrots
  5. Once the chicken is cooked, but not cooked to death, take out and reserve for later,  and toss veggies into the hot wok starting with the garlic to perfume the pan
  6. Once you’ve sweated the veggies, add the scallions and deglaze the pan with some fish sauce (or soy sauce)
  7. Add a few heaping spoonfuls of curry paste and make sure that it gets evenly distributed so that it gets incorporated throughout the dish
  8. After cooking the curry paste into the veggies for a few minutes, add your coconut milk and mix thoroughly, and this would also be the time to add some sambal olek chili paste or dried chilies if you like a spicy curry. Can skip this if you want.
  9. Simmer for a few minutes, then add the chicken back into the pan along with the roasted potatoes which should be done at this point. This would also be a time to add other starchy ingredients you might be using: roasted squash, pumpkin, sweet potato, tofu, etc.
  10. Simmer uncovered for about 10-15 min so that curry thickens up
  11. Serve immediately over noodles or rice and garnish with cilantro and Thai chilies, or put it in the fridge and eat it the next day. So delicious as leftovers — Yum!

Enjoy and let me know how yours turned out!

Cooking Under Quarantine — Cajun Comfort!

Cooking Under Quarantine is back! In this episode, we’re making Chicken and Sausage Jambalaya.

I ate Jambalaya for the first (and certainly not the last!) time while visiting New Orleans. New Orleans is the kind of city that foodie dreams are made of, and I love it. In the past, I’d visit about once a year with friends and we’d spend a long weekend eating delicious cajun food, drinking, spending time at the pool, then rinse and repeat.

So, when I thought of what to make next in this series, the choice was easy. Jambalaya is a hearty rice-based dish with meat and/or seafood, tomato, veggies and a little cajun kick. This comforting one-pot dish comes together in under an hour and is super versatile and adaptable for cooks of any level. So follow along with Chef Jon and let us know how yours turned out!

Chicken and Sausage Jambalaya

Ingredients:

  • Boneless chicken breast or thighs, 1-2lb
  • Andouille sausage (or another kind of smoked sausage), 4 links
  • Onions, 1 big or 2 small, chopped 
  • Carrots, 2, chopped 
  • Bell pepper, 2 chopped 
  • Scallions, 1 bunch
  • Can of crushed tomatoes, 28oz can
  • Tomato paste, small can
  • Cajun seasoning, 2-3tbsp
  • Gumbo file, 2 tsp (optional)
  • Rice, 1 cup
  • Chicken broth (or vegetable broth), 1-2 cups
  • Garlic, 5-6 cloves
  • Favorite brand of hot sauce

Directions:

  1. Heat olive oil frying pan with at least a 1 inch lip, and sauté sausage for at 7-10 min until browned but not 100% cooked through
  2. Remove sausage from pan and set aside for later.
  3. In the sausage fat, start to sauté your veggies. Season with salt and pepper 
  4. Add garlic once veggies are soft and sauté until starting to brown
  5. Make a well in middle of pan by pushing veggies to the sides, and add chicken
  6. Once chicken has browned, add 1-2 spoonfuls of tomato paste as well as Cajun seasoning
  7. Add rice to pan and toast for a couple of minutes
  8. Add crushed tomatoes and broth and give the pan a few big stirs so everything is mixed up well. Also add sausage back into the pan
  9. Cover and cook for 20-25 min depending on what kind of rice you’re using — stir pan every 5-10 min but don’t mess with it too much. Add extra liquid if needed
  10. Garnish with chopped scallions and add hot sauce

Enjoy y’all!

Let’s Talk Tuna — Tuna Pasta Puttanesca

While everything is going on, even a quick run to the grocery store has become a great feat. So, it seems like a great time to use up those items in your pantry. Something that I almost always have in my cabinet? Canned tuna.

Now, I too love a great tuna sandwich, but tuna salad gets boring after a while, amirite? Enter “Tuna Pasta Puttanesca” — this hearty, comforting pasta dish pulls double duty as not only a delicious dinner, but also uses up ingredients you might not have even remembered you had! Tomatoes, olives, capers, and our star ingredient, TUNA, make this easy meal a crowd pleaser and it’s packed with protein so will feed about 4 or 2-3 very hungry people!

Tuna Pasta Puttanesca

Ingredients:

  • 1lb of pasta (traditionally made with Spaghetti, but you can use any pasta)
  • 28oz can of crushed tomatoes or your favorite jar of tomato sauce
  • 1 tbsp dried basil
  • 1 tbsp dried oregano
  • 1 tbsp of minced garlic or 3-4 cloves finely chopped
  • 1 tin of anchovies in oil
  • 1 small jar of capers, halfway drained
  • 1/4 – 1/2 cup of olives — your favorite kind
  • 2-3 tbsp of tomato paste
  • 2 cans of tuna fish
  • Olive oil
  • Salt
  • 1-2 tsp crushed red pepper flakes (optional)

Directions:

  1. Put a pot of water (at least 6-8 cups) on medium-high heat to start heating up.
  2. In a flat sauté pan (with at least a 1/2 inch lip), add some olive oil and put over medium heat until the oil starts to shimmer.
  3. Add the anchovies 1-2 at a time to the oil, so they start to “melt.”
  4. Once the anchovies start breaking down, add the garlic and use the back of your spoon to spread out.
  5. Once the garlic starts to brown, add all the herbs and red pepper flakes until you begin to smell the aroma of the herbs coming off the pan.
  6. Add the tomato paste and break up with your spoon.
  7. After 3-4 minutes, add the capers and olives, including half of the caper brine.
  8. Let this cook for a few minutes until there is only a little bit of liquid left, and it is mostly solid and mixed in with the tomatoes.
  9. Add the can of crushed tomatoes and give this a big stir to blend everything.
  10.  Once this mixture comes to a simmer, reduce heat to medium-low.
  11.  In the meantime, your water should have come to a boil — make sure it’s a rolling boil!
  12.  Add a big handful of salt to the water — this step is needed to not only season the pasta but also help the sauce come together later from the starch that comes off the pasta.
  13.  Add the pasta to the water and give it a swirl.
  14.  Add the tuna to the tomato mixture and mix it into the sauce.
  15.  Cook pasta for about 10 minutes, stirring every so often to separate strands/pieces.
  16.  Once pasta is al dente (still has a slight bite), add it directly to the saucepan along with a little bit of pasta water (make sure you reserve some more pasta water for later), and bring the heat to medium/medium-high.
  17.  Toss pasta in the sauce and heat through for a few minutes so the flavors can come together.
  18.  Serve yourself a big bowl of Tuna Pasta Puttanesca — you did it! Yum!