Like Something That Came out of a Microwave Meal

Despite being dog-tired Sunday night, I was itching to try something new for supper. I didn't have much of a hankering for any flavor in particular, nor did the boys. So into my trove of recipes that have piqued my interest I dove...and I pulled out a dud.

Orange-ginger Skillet Chicken1 C chopped orange sections
1/2 C orange juice
1/4 C chopped green onions
1/4 C low-sodium soy sauce
3 T fresh lemon juice
2 T olive oil
1 T honey
2 t grated peeled fresh ginger
1 t ground coriander seeds
1 1/2 lb. chicken breast tenders
8 C cooked rotini (about 1 lb. uncooked corkscrew pasta)

1. At home, combine the chopped oranges, OJ, chopped green onions, soy sauce, lemon juice, olive oil, honey, grated ginger and ground coriander in a large heavy-duty zip-top plastic bag and seal.
   
2. Place the chicken and cooked pasta in separate large heavy-duty zip-top plastic bags and seal.
   
3. At the campsite, add the chicken to marinade, seal the bag and marinate in a cooler for 3 hours.
   
4. Heat a large cast-iron skillet over hot coals (or over medium-high heat if at home).
   
5. Add the chicken mixture to the skillet, and cook it 15 min.
   
6. Add the pasta and simmer 5 min. or until the chicken is done and the pasta is thoroughly heated.

Yield: 6 servings (serving size: 2 cups)

Nutritional Info
Calories: 473
Fat: 7.3 g
Sat fat: 1.2 g
Protein: 36.2 g
Carbs: 63.7 g
Fiber: 3.7 g
Cholesterol: 66 mg
Sodium: 433 mg

The Faudie's Futzings
No, Gentle Reader, the boys and I weren't camping last Sunday, and we sure as hell weren't having some kind of outdoor culinary experience. (I've slept out-of-doors twice in my life and have no desire to add to that number.) I apologize if I disappoint you in any way when I say that I prepared this dish in the comfort of Chez Boeckman-Walker. No open fires were involved.

Maybe, though, an open fire would have made this dish more interesting. Or maybe if I'd followed the recipe more closely, the final result would have had more zip:

• I didn't let the chicken marinate for three hours. I think it maybe got 30 minutes.
  
• I used just under a tablespoon of olive oil in the marinade. Two tablespoons struck me as an awful lot.
  
• I was fresh out of green onions, and after a long weekend, I was not pedaling down to HEB to pick some up.
  
• I completely forgot to add the soy sauce to the marinate. It went in not long after the chicken started to cook through.
  
• I used bottled minced ginger, so sue me.
  
• I squeezed two whole lemons into the marinade. Don't ask me how close that might have been to the required 3 tablespoons.

As for the bed upon which the chicken and its sauce rest, I wasn't interested in eating this dish on rotini or any other pasta. I'm just not a pasta person, as I believe I've stated before. However, the boy is a pasta person. He thinks its exotic. (Hell, if you really want to knock his socks off, make him bad old-fashioned Americanized spaghetti. Talk about a blissed-out boy!) Me, I think pasta is rather dull and incapable of really absorbing flavors. And really, it's not supposed to. From what I've read here and there, particularly in Bill Buford's Heat
, pasta traditionally is the center of a meal at which it is served. It's not interchangeable with rice or another grain, to be smothered and lost under some sauce or other concoction as it is in America. But given how shitty American pasta-in-a-box is, that's probably the only way to make it palatable.

But I digress. I had a boy to feed and my own palate to please, so I made two bedding materials: I boiled up the last of the penne I had on hand for the boy (and the husband, who expressed an interest in trying the meat and sauce atop it), and I prepared 8 ounces of whole wheat couscous for me and the husband. Why couscous? Because I thought that some of the content of the marinade--the chopped oranges, in particular--would work well with the grain as they do in the orange couscous salad I love so dearly.

Sadly, I was grossly mistaken. I don't know if the greatly reduced marinating time foiled the flavor of this dish or if adding the soy sauce at the last minute did it, but I just didn't think the chicken and sauce had any...well, pop, for lack of a better word. I was expecting some tanginess from the citrus and some savory from the soy sauce and maybe a hint of sweet from the honey, but I didn't detect any of those notes. No, to my taste buds, the whole dish was just bland-not really orangy, not really gingery, not really anything at all. I felt like I need to apologize to the couscous for wasting it on this dish.

The husband reported the pasta didn't add much to the experience. For his part, the boy wolfed down his pasta. May the FSM help me the day he discovers Chef Boyardee. ::shudder::

Shameless Plug

In my Halloween post, I shared with you, Gentle Reader, pictures of the cupcakes and cake lollipops my dear friend, the world's greatest Spin instructor and, now, professional baker made for me and the boys. I mentioned at the time that I could not share her enterprise's Web site for it was not yet up.

Well, that's now changed!

The moment you finish reading this post, get yer arse over to SweetTreetsAustin.com. No, Gentle Reader, I take that back. Strap on a bib or strip off your shirt and then get yer eyeballs over to SweetTreetsAustin.com. Trust me, you'll be glad you took that shirt-protecting measure because the pictures Jackie's posted of her goodies are guaranteed to make you drool.

Not only do these little cake creations look incredible, but they taste incredible too. No Betty Crapper or Dinky Hines just-add-water muck here! And certainly no whipped, tastes-like-Crisco fluff atop them either. That's real buttercream frosting you see, Gentle Reader--enough so to make Paula Deen give a "Yeehah!" of pride.

Yeah, that Paula Deen, patron saint of atherosclerosis.

But I digress. (Not that I don't enjoy poking fun at Madame du Beurre whenever I can. She's an easy target for someone like me. And yes, I am that pathetic.)

My birthday is next Wednesday, and I'm anxious to know what cupcake I might receive. When she asked what kind I liked, I asked if she'd ever whipped up a carrot cake or a spice cake or even a zucchini cake--and at the time, she'd just earlier that day chucked a bunch of either carrot cake cupcakes or zucchini cupcakes from a large batch she'd whipped up for work because she didn't have room for them in her freezer and sure as hell didn't need them sitting around tempting her. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that she might have needed to whip up another batch of any of those three flavors and set one aside for me.

Speaking of birthdays, I've already placed my order for some extra-special Sweet Treets for the husband for his birthday. Granted, that's not until January, but I have no doubt they'll be very special.

And if you're lucky enough to live in the Austin area, Gentle Reader, keep Sweet Treets in mind the next time you need some delicious, artful cupcakes for some event or just for the hell of it. You will not regret placing an order for your own Sweet Treets. Well, maybe you will if you scarf down the whole order all by yourself....

You Put the Lime in the Coconut

The husband, like me, got booted from selling plasma temporarily thanks to a low protein level. To improve his chances of passing his second SPE test, I gave him leave to take over my kitchen and befoul it with beef, in all its red meat, protein-packed glory.

--The Faudie

Angela found a recipe for crunchy coconut and lime burgers on AllRecipes.com a few months ago, and we finally got around to trying it out. Why now, you ask? Maybe a tropical-themed recipe was what we needed on an overcast and rainy day. Or maybe I'll jump at any excuse to find video of Kermit the Frog singing that "Coconut" song on YouTube. Which led, of course, to either the me or the boy endlessly singing "You put the lime in the coconut...you put the lime in the coconut...you put the lime in the coconut....," for the rest of the day. We're sure the song has other lyrics, but they aren't as much fun to sing.

Where was I? Oh, yeah, the recipe:

Crunchy Coconut and Lime Burgers

1 lb. ground beef
1/2 C unsweetened shredded dried coconut
1/4 C chopped fresh cilantro
1 egg
2 T lime juice
2 T Worcestershire sauce
1 T cream of coconut
1 t soy sauce
1 1/2 t salt

1 C mayonnaise
2 t cream of coconut
1 T chopped fresh cilantro

1 T vegetable oil
1 C unsweetened shredded dried coconut
1/2 t salt
4 hamburger buns, split

1. Combine the beef, 1/2 cup coconut, cilantro, egg, lime juice, Worcestershire sauce, 1 tablespoon cream of coconut, soy sauce and 1 1/2 teaspoons salt in a bowl until well mixed. Form into four patties and set aside.

2. Stir together the mayonnaise with 2 teaspoons of cream of coconut and 1 tablespoon of cilantro and set aside.
   
3. Heat the vegetable oil in a skillet over medium heat.
   
4. Stir in 1 cup of coconut and 1/2 teaspoon salt, then cook and stir until the coconut has turned golden brown.
   
5. Drain the toasted coconut on a paper towel-lined plate and set aside.
6. Preheat an outdoor grill for medium-high heat, and lightly oil grate.
7. Cook the burgers on the preheated grill to your desired degree of doneness (about 4 min. per side for medium-well).
8. Spread both cut sides of the hamburger buns with the cilantro mayonnaise.
   
9. Place the cooked burgers on the bottom buns, sprinkle with the toasted coconut and serve.

Yield: Four burgers

Nutritional Info
Calories: 1,166
Total fat: 96.4 g
Cholesterol: 188 mg

The Husband's Futzings
There were more than a few:

• I omitted the cilantro from the patties, knowing the boy doesn't like it (though I did use cilantro in the spread, of which I only made a fourth of the recommended amount, figuring that would be more than enough for us).
  
• I also omitted the egg at Angela's suggestion, as we assumed the patties would hold together fine without a binding agent because I used ground sirloin that was 90% lean.
  
• I used only a third of the amount of salt called for, based on feedback left on the recipe at AllRecipes.com.
  
• I squeezed two limes for their juice, which was probably more than two tablespoons.
  
• I flat-out forgot to include the soy sauce.
  
• The coconut was unsweetened chips, not unsweetened flakes. And Angela toasted them in about a teaspoon of ghee.
  
• I used Miracle Whip Light instead of mayo.

The recipe came together without any major complications. Angela was correct in suggesting the egg could be left out with no ill effects; the patties held together fine with no egg.

In fact, the only issue we ran into concerned our table service. After Angela prepared the toasted coconut, the kiddo was charged with taking it to the dining table. On the way (while singing a repeating refrain of "You put the lime in the coconut," of course), he lost his grip on the bowl and half of the coconut ended up on the floor. Oh, well. We'd made more than we needed, really.

The finished burgers, I'm pleased to report, were very tasty. Unlike the blueberry beef burgers, which didn't seem to have much blueberry flavor, both the coconut and the lime were quite prominent. The cilantro mayonnaise, even when slathered on thickly, didn't overpower the flavor of the patties. So I'd say this recipe was a success, certainly.

Tiki-tastic cuisine

Will we make these burgers again any time soon? Only the Tiki gods can say for certain, but I'd imagine we're not likely to prepare this recipe often. Angela doesn't enjoy beef, and the boy dislikes coconut enough that he actually removed the coconut from his patty. So if and when we make crunchy coconut and lime burgers again, I suspect we'll be making them for me alone!