Monthly Archives: November 2017

Basic Cooking Skills

Basic skills – Cooking and Shredding Chicken

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Cooking and Shredding Chicken

1-2 lb. chicken (breast, bone-in split breasts, boneless breasts, thighs)
Water
Large stew pot
Salt
Pepper
Lawry’s Garlic Salt
Wawatusa Village Seasoning (or celery seed or celery salt)
Heat source – duh!

Turn heat to low-medium heat.
Add water to stew pot and lay chicken in.
Add more water to cover and sprinkle on spices.
Cover and let slow cook for an hour to and hour and a half.
Remove chicken from broth and let cool for 10 min. Shred for recipes.
Strain broth for recipes.

Note: You can add taco, fajita, or barbecue seasonings into the pot depending on the use of the shredded chicken.

It was always amazing to me how a lot of our customers didn’t know how to do basic things in the kitchen. I even had a friend who messed up jello. Jello!!! She made one batch that remained water, essentially; and one batch that set up like concrete. …. She did the same thing both times. Go figure.
Then I think, wait a minute, I didn’t know how to do a few basic things before beginning this catering adventure. And I promptly stopped laughing at everyone else – mostly.
For example: cooking chicken. Not baking or grilling, but cooking to shred for recipes. Easy, yes. But my family had never eaten much chicken and we didn’t make casseroles and such so this was largely uncharted territory for me. And cooking it so that it remained tender and not rubbery – that’s the key.
Cook it slow. There’s the secret. If you don’t have time to let a few pounds of chicken cook overnight or all day in a crockpot or slow cooker, you can boil it rather quickly (about an hour for a couple pounds). But even then, cook on lower heat so that the meat doesn’t get tough. If you are cooking more than a pound or two, up your time a little bit. You’ll know when it’s done. Poke a knife or fork in after about and hour and if it falls apart or the implement of choice slices in super easy, it’s done. (Or just cut it and make sure there’s no pink.)

Delicious Dishes

Gravy is Tops – Poppy Seed Chicken

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Poppy Seed Chicken

2 (10-oz. cans) cream of chicken soup
8 oz. cream cheese
1/3 cup chicken broth
6 cups chicken, chopped or shredded
3/4 tsp. black pepper
3 Tbs. poppy seeds
1 stick (1/2 cup) butter, melted
1 1/2 sleeves Ritz crackers, crushed

Heat cream of chicken soup, cream cheese and chicken broth in large saucepan over medium heat, whisking to prevent sticking.
Mix melted butter with crackers.
Place rice in 9×13 greased pan.
Put 3 cups cooked rice in bottom of pan (If using rice instead of noodles. If using noodles, bake the chicken and layer on cooked noodles.)
Layer chicken onto rice.
Pour gravy over chicken.
Top with cracker mixture.
Sprinkle with poppy seeds.
Bake at 350 degrees for 20-30 minutes.

 

How we got so poppy:
The previous owner did have some excellent recipes. Some of which had come about from trial and error; and some from a sweet lady that had worked for him. She’d formerly worked in some facet for the test kitchens of a major magazine.
So, as we kept churning out new recipes, new requests, new mistakes …. we kept steady with the old tried and true favorites. Several customers had been asking about a chicken dish with gravy. You just can’t go wrong with gravy. I believe it is a Southern staple. You could serve stale bread or some meat surprise, and as long as gravy sits atop, folks would lap it up. … Well, maybe not. But gravy is a dish picker-upper.
JoAnne knew they must be talking about Poppy Seed Chicken. So the very day we made this and e-mailed it to our customers on the daily menu, we sold out within the hour.
Added bonus: This dish has no onion chunks in it, so I liked it too.