Quiche Gone Wrong

You know how sometimes everything that can go wrong does?  That was mostly the story of our quiche, as you'll see below.

It started with the eggs.  I swore I had enough in the fridge, I'd even bought some the other day, but when my son went looking, he came back with only two.  We needed four.  I sent him out to the hen house and lucky for us they'd decided to actually earn their keep that morning, because he returned with two eggs. 

He made the dough and pressed it into the pan.  His sister wanted to do the dough too, so there was some argument over that.  It was a weeknight so I'd decided we weren't going to have time to chill the dough for long, just a few minutes before I blind baked it.  I turned the oven on (or so I thought....), I put the crust in the fridge when he was done and...totally forgot about it.

Next step in the recipe was to steam the spinach.  Now here's where the microwave provided the bright spot in the evening's escapades.  I was not about to get out a giant pot of water, boil it, load spinach into a steamer, where it would take on a lot of water, and then wash all those dishes.  Instead I piled it into a big bowl, put some plastic wrap over the mound and stuck it in the microwave on 'fresh vegetables'.  A couple of minutes later I had a nicely drained pile of cooked spinach sitting on my chopping board.  A couple of papertowels helped squeeze the water out and voila - cooked, drained spinach that didn't have that chewy frozen-spinach texture.  This was the high point.

I got the crust out (forgetting that I meant to blind bake it) and poured the quiche mixture in.  Then remembered about the blind baking.  Oh well, another experiment.  I opened the oven.  Stone cold.  I had set the temperature without turning on the oven.  So I cranked it, while the quiche sat in the uncooked crust, and waited.  When it was almost warm, I put the quiche in the oven, set the timer for the higher end of the recommended cooking time (40 mn) and retired to the living room with the sous-chefs to do homework and nibble on chips and salsa.

When the timer beeped, I opened the oven and saw this:

I guess that oven heated right up, huh?

So, after I peeled all the burnt bits off and put them in the chicken's pile, here's what I put on the table:

The ending of the story isn't that bad though.  The quiche was really very good, the crust, while it would have improved with a blind baking, was done.  The filling was 1/2 a large onion and 2 cloves of mashed garlic, sauted with one chorizo sausage, crumbled, then mixed with 2/3 cup half and half, 2 eggs, 1/4 cup parmasean cheese and 1 bag of spinach, microwave-steamed and chopped.  Some salt and pepper and it was good to go into the crust.  We recommend blind-baking the crust.  And not burning the quiche.

Passable for a weeknight.

Tortellini with Chorizo Sauce

We made this dinner last week, another easy comfort-food dinner, made with pantry and freezer ingredients.
Served with a side of veggies (carrots and zucchini cooked in the microwave), it's a simple but wholesome dinner.

My son wanted to be in charge of dinner, so I directed and he prepared.  It was fun, and simple enough that he could do it all himself, starting with salting the pasta water.

I buy chorizo at the grocery store, in the meat section near the hotdogs and hispanic foods, and keep them in the freezer since I never use more than one at a time and they're sold in packs of 8.

One thing we learned the hard (messy!) way is don't forget to pierce the skin of the sausage if you decide to defrost it in the microwave.  Ka-Boom!

Of course, that's how my son learned the all-important lesson: when something explodes in the microwave, clean it up right away!

Tortellini with Chorizo Sauce

1 chorizo sausage
1 can (15 oz) diced tomatoes
1/2 cup V8 juice*
1/2 cup chicken broth
1/2 cup diced onions

1 lb dried tortellini

* if you don't have V8, you can substitute a small can of tomato paste and use 3/4 cups chicken broth instead)

Put a large pot of water on to boil, salted and covered.
Brown the sausage in a wide non-stick frying pan.  Add the diced onions (you may have these in the freezer if you do this) and cook until the onions are soft.  Add the liquids and bring to a simmer.

By this time, your water should be boiling.  Add the tortellini and cook according to the package (typically about 11 minutes).

Let the sauce simmer while the pasta cooks.  Microwave the veggies and set the table.

Drain the tortellini and add them to the sauce.  Mix and serve.

Total preparation time: about 20 minutes.

For the record, it's helpful to actually put the vegetables on the table when you eat, instead of leaving them in the microwave where you will find them the next morning....

Chorizo Chicken

I'm always looking for ways to boost the flavor of dishes without making them completely unhealthful.  Chorizo is like bacon, one of those amazing flavors that just doesn't fit our diet in large portions.  I tried a recipe from A Platter of Figs (an amazing cookbook if you haven' seen it yet) and it used a small quantity of chorizo to flavor a fish soup.  It's a great recipe, and it provided the inspiration for this chicken dish.

We find chorizo here in the grocery store, in rather large quantities.  Luckily, it lends itself to freezing so it's easy to keep some in the freezer, just like bacon.

By using a little bit for flavoring, the spicyness becomes a plesant part of the dish.  You could start out with half the amount, if you've got kids who don't like spicy food, but this is a pretty mild dish, even with the full amount.

Saute one chorizo sausage (skin removed) in a large non-stick frying pan.

Drain the extra fat, add one diced onion and several chopped cloves of garlic.  When the onions are beginning to soften, about 6 minutes, nestle 6 boneless chicken thighs (or other chicken cut) into the chorizo/onion mix.  Cook for about 4 minutes, then turn and cook 4 minutes more. 

Add 1-1.5 cups chicken broth (enough to nearly cover the thighs) and cover the pan.  Let the thighs cook about 6 minutes more, until the chicken is cooked through.  Add a very small pasta (such as pastina) to the pan and cook until al dente.  Serve with a hearty whole grain bread and a fresh salad or other vegetable dish.

The leftovers were even better the next day.

The kids enjoyed chopping, measuring and....eating!