Roasted Chicken Ravioli

See the picture above? Doesn’t that make your mouth just get ready for a great dinner? Well it did us! Unfortunately it was terrible, well at least to us it was. I should explain why………Last night we went to Sams to pick up a few things for our Labor Day BBQ and I spotted these ravioli in their case, the package said Roasted Chicken and Cheese Ravioli……YMMMM….ravioli is one of our favorites and I have made roasted chicken ravioli from scratch before, it takes quite a bit of time and these in the case looked so pretty we decided to give them a try. I am trying to make some things this week that won’t be on our BBQ so we get some variety this week. Today I took two chicken breasts out of the freezer and seasoned them then let them sit to defrost, I figured I would make a quick dinner of the chicken breasts and some ravioli all baked together with some mozzarella. The pasta being what the store labels as “fresh”, although how fresh could it possibly be when it has an expiration date more than 30 days away, would only take a few minutes to cook, mixed with some home made sauce and cheese and then baked for a few minutes and topped with the breasts that were sauteed on the stove top. It was a very simple dinner to plan and cook and was done in under 30 minutes and it looked so pretty and appetizing when I brought it to the table. We each took a portion and hubby took a bite and didn’t say anything, he just gave me a funny little look. I asked him if it was alright and he still didn’t say anything but took a few bites of his chicken. I cut one of the large ravioli in half and took a bite, it was quite nice I thought. I ate a bit of my chicken breast and noticed hubby hadn’t touched his ravioli again, I cut a second ravioli in half and took one half up on my fork, as I took the first chew of it I almost choked…………it was nothing but raw garlic stuffed inside the pasta. Now I should say hubby is not fond of a strong garlic flavor, me on the other hand I like the taste of a bit of garlic and if you have been reading this blog you know I do use it and hubby eats all the foods I use it in. Neither one of us however are fond of raw garlic and especially not fond of getting a mouth full of raw garlic stuffed into pasta that is supposed to be filled with chicken and cheese. Hubby finished his chicken breast and dumped his ravioli in the trash can…………me on the other hand cut into each one of the ravioli and found that they were all different, some were indeed what the package acclaimed them to be and others were just filled with a bit of cheese and then others with nothing but raw garlic, in any case I think the manufacturers need to get someone on their quality control issue with these, we sure won’t be buying them again and tonights dinner was a real bust for us. Thank goodness I didn’t serve them for dinner tomorrow night as it is our 40th anniversary and hubby would have thought I was trying to get rid of him, he just ate a bowl of cereal to make up for his non existant dinner. If you really love the taste of raw garlic you may want to try these from Sams, they are in the refridgerator cases (not freezer cases) near the fresh meat area.

Roasted Chicken Ravioli

Best Ever Rib Roast

Tonight we had what we have all agreed is the best rib roast I have ever made! What made it so good? A new to me technique I came upon quite by accident. If you have been reading my posts then you know that we were very lucky and a local store had whole rib roasts on sale at quite a low price, we had picked up two of them and they were cut into steaks and roasts, this was the last of the roasts. I had forgotten to take it from the freezer and put it in the fridge last night so it could defrost. I remembered I was supposed to make the roast today at about 1 o’clock and took it from the freezer and placed it on the counter with the hope it would at least defrost halfway before I had to cook it. At 3 o’clock it was still frozen rock solid except for about a quarter inch on the outside, I was now in a panic as I had nothing else handy to prepare. I went ahead and seasoned it and put it on a rack in a shallow roasting pan while I heated the oven up to 400 degrees. I know there is a technique some use where they start the roast at a high heat and then lower it for a long cook time and I have used it with great results but today I didn’t have the luxury of time on my side. I put the roast in the oven and left it at 400 for 2 hours then shut the oven off and left the roast in there for another hour, in the meantime I searched for my digital thermometer, which I never did manage to find. When hubby got home I took the roast out of the oven and hoped for the best, I did tell him that I might have to finish cooking our dinner in a saute pan after it was cut into steaks, he was ok with that. I got the green beans ready and cut the potatoes open and then took the meat and my carving knife and cut the first slice……….it was a thing of beauty! It was done with a crispy outside and a beautiful pink inside, but the best thing was how moist it was, it was tender and just melted in our mouths. The time it had spent sitting in the oven with the burner off had done a wonderful job of keeping the juice inside and making the meat so tender. This dinner was a resounding success and this is my new technique for doing a rib roast. The roast tonight was about 2 1/2 pounds and did not shrink at all as far as I could tell.

Best Ever Rib Roast

A local market has large bone in half chicken breasts for a dollar a pound. I am telling you these half breasts are LARGE. I bought four packs of four half breasts each and the total weight for them all came to over18 pounds. Thats 18 pounds of really beautiful breasts for all of 18 dollars, it also means lots and lots of nice bones to make stock when I get done de-boning them. De-boning takes a while to do but at the price for such a large size breast it is sure worth my time to me. I usually buy this size large boneless breasts at our local warehouse club place and consider myself lucky when they are about $2.18 a pound, that means I am paying over a dollar more per pound than I did for these that I have here now and I get no bones to make my stock.  With a little work I have the bonus of all those lovely bones for some great stock that gets used in a lot of my cooking. I like the larger sized breasts because they are nice to stuff and also to split and make all kinds of dishes from, I don’t care for the small boneless frozen breasts that you can also get at the big warehouse clubs. I’ll tell you how I am making the chicken stock here now, I am using these bones plus some bony wing tips and backs that were in the freezer, I have 2 of my 8 quart pressure cookers making it as I type and the smells coming from them is magnificent, it is making me very hungry for some soup on this stormy day.

                                                     Chicken Stock

Enough bones with some meat attached to almost fill the pressure cooker

5 sprigs of parsley

1 large onion washed and cut in half, I don’t peel it as long as all the dirt comes off

2 large stalks of celery, washed and broken in half

1 teaspoon whole black peppercorns

Place all of the above into a large oiled roasting pan and place in a 425 degree oven until they are nicely browned, stir once or twice during cooking. When they are a nice brown, remove the pan from the oven and set it on the stovetop. Add the contents of the roasting pan to the pressure cooker and then turn the heat on under the roasting pan, add 1 quart of water and stir and scrape the pan to get all the fond off of it, when the liquid comes to a low boil turn off the stove and carefully pour the contents into the pressure cooker. Close the top to the cooker and set it for 1 hour. When the timer goes off let the pressure release on its own. Pour the stock thru a fine strainer lined with cheesecloth, press on the bones to extract all the broth. Discard all the solids and let the temp come down on the stock and then refridgerate until it is cold. When it is cold and the fat has come to the top, remove the fat layer and put the stock into smaller containers and store in the freezer. I use 1-2 cups air tight containers to store my stock, the smaller size lets the stock defrost quickly when I need it. I use this for soups, gravies, to moisten bread for stuffing/dressing and all kinds of things, thats is why I don’t really season this stock as I make it, I want a pretty nuetral strong chicken taste for my basic stock, I can always add fresh herbs when I actually use it in a dish.

     This week is my favorite week of the whole year, the reason is THANKSGIVING!!! As someone who loves to cook I am in heaven. I get to cooks lots of dishes and spend time with others enjoying a meal. There is a side of it that saddens me too, I think about those who don’t have the luxury of a meal with those they love or a real home to keep them safe and warm. We are living in tough times right now and many people are hurting and I feel for them, we have been in those same shoes a few times in years past, we are thankful that we are holding on now and our heads are above water. I wish I could feed all those out there that have a need for it and let them know that someone does think about them.

     This year I will probably make our standard turkey, a small ham and either a lasagna or some manicotti. There will also be some mashed potatoes, fresh steamed broccoli, green beans, cauliflower, carrots and some baked beans and of course the dressing to go with the turkey and cranberry. I don’t know if anyone besides hubby and myself and Matt and Rachel will be here to eat but anyone who knows us knows that the door is always open and they are welcome for a meal, at times we have had up to 50 or more show up during the course of the day. If there is one thing I will miss,  it is that I don’t think I will ever see my childrens faces all together again around our table during this holiday in my lifetime and that leaves one with a somewhat empty feeling inside at times, hubby says it means that there won’t be any food fights and dinner will be peaceful and quiet, but give me those wild rambunctious antics the boys pulled all the years they were home and I will be happy, through all the good times and bad, no matter what was ever going on in our lives they could make us laugh with their antics.

     Most of the prep for my cooking fest is already done, if I have learned anything in all the years I have been making this massive dinner it is DO AS MUCH AS YOU CAN IN THE WEEK BEFORE! Seriously, such little things as chopping the onions and celery for your stuffing and then bagging them in ZipLocks will go a long way in preserving your sanity come the big day, it will also allow you to be relaxed and spend time with whoever you are spending your time with rather than rushing around trying to get everything done on the big day. Tomorrow night the turkeys will be put in to brine overnight and the stuffing will be assembled and refridgerated, Thanksgiving morning the potatoes will be peeled once the turkeys in the oven and then the veggies will all be steamed right before we sit down. The turkey stock for the gravy and to moisten the stuffing has already been made and frozen. All the veggies have been cleaned and prepped and then bagged, ready to be simply steamed Thursday. The cheese mixture for either the lasagna or manicotti is already mixed and containered, if I do the lasagna I already have the meat mixture frozen and will just have to defrost it and assemble the pan of lasagna and bake it, the manicotti doesn’t use meat so that can just be put together in about 5 minutes and baked in the little convection oven while the big oven has the turkey in it, the little side oven on my stove is just big enough for the ham.

     I hope all the readers of this blog have a wonderful holiday with great food and friends to share it with. I will try to upload some pictures of the table before it gets attacked on Thursday.

Mattie

This is the basic stuffing recipe I use, you can add apples or other fruits and nuts to it to vary it if you like. You can also add some cooked bulk sausage to it for a different taste.
This will stuff a 25 pound turkey, with some left over, cut the recipe down for smaller birds.

16 cups of toasted bread cubes
1/2 pound butter
3-4 cups of turkey or chicken stock, depending on your breads dryness
2 cups of diced onions
2 cups of diced celery
1 cup of fresh chopped parsley
1 tablespoon thyme leaves
1 tablespoon sage leaves
salt and pepper to taste

Saute the onion and celery in the butter for 10 minutes, add the stock and bring to a simmer, add the thyme, sage and parsley. Put the bread cubes in a large bowl and add the wet ingredients, mix together thoroughly with your hands, taste and add salt and pepper. Fill cavity of turkey with mixture and bake any leftover in a separate baking dish.

When I make this I typically use a home made bread that I add some of the same seasonings to while I mix the dough, then bake it, and let that bread dry out for a week or two before I use it. Any mixture of different breads or rolls can be used, you want the bread or rolls to be stale and toasted though so they soak up the broth. How much broth you will actually need depends on how dry your bread is, and how moist you prefer your stuffing.

Happy Holidays!

Mattie

You will notice that in a lot of my recipes I use stocks. I used to be a big user of butter in all my cooking and I still use butter, but I have found that stock adds lots of flavor to lots of different dishes and it cuts down on all the butter we used to go through.
Making stock is simple, especially if you have access to a pressure cooker. You can make a decent stock in the pressure cooker in about 30 minutes, you can then use this stock to make soups, gravy, all kinds of sauces, moisten the bread for your stuffing etc. It is a versitile item to have on hand, if you looked in my freezer at any given time you would find all different kinds of stocks in various containers, I go through lots of it in my cooking.
There are many ways to make a proper stock but I am a simple girl cooking simple food for my family and this is what I do.
Take a pressure cooker (I love my electric digitals) and add whatever chicken parts you have available, wings, backs, thighs etc. Fill the pot halfway with the chicken, add a large onion, 2 broken in half celery stalks, 2 carrots broken in half, some peppercorns and 2 bay leaves to it, add water to come a little over the chicken but never fill the pot more than 3/4 full. Close the pot and set pressure to high, set timer to at least 60 minutes and push start. Let the pressure go down by itself when the timer is finished, open the pot and strain the broth through a fine mesh strainer or a strainer lined with cheesecloth. Discard the solids or give the meat to your pets (they will love you for it, and you can’t use it any other way). Pour the stock into small containers and refridgerate overnight, remove the layer of fat from the top when it is thoroughly chilled and then freeze the stock in useable portions.
You will notice I don’t add salt or many seasonings to my stock, Hubby has high blood pressure so I have stopped salting foods pretty much when I am cooking them, I can always add it later but can’t remove it once I put it in, I don’t put anything else into the stock until I actually use it, I don’t want it to taste too herby in certain dishes.
I make pork and beef stocks the same way and have those on hand in the freezer too. You can also roast the meat and bones you use for stock making if you have the time , and make a little richer stock from them but, at this stage in life I am all for any shortcuts I can take and still produce some good meals so I usually do this quick version. The longer you can let the stock cook the more flavor it will have.
You can also do this on the stovetop in a regular stockpot, bring it to a low boil and skim it frequently, never let it come to a full boil. It will produce a nice stock in a few hours time and then proceed as above and chill then freeze it.
If you want to save time however, run and get yourself a pressure cooker, either a digital or a stovetop and then join a great Yahoo Group to find out all about them. I belong to just about the best one out there, it is owned by Ray and it is at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PressureCookerRecipes/
Ray also owns a group for the new Ninja Master Prep Machine, find that group at  http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ninjamasterprep/ , another great group for kitchen gadgets is owned by a lady named Linda and is at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/KitchenAppliancesAndRecipes/ . If you are looking for some great inspriation for all things kitchen join one or all of these and let the fun begin.
Mattie