Chickin and Dumplings

I totally played hokey from work today came home early went to the grocery store and made a new recipe that I got from a friend. Chicken and dumplings!! WOW this was awesome. Here is the really simple recipe ( it will feed you for a week)
Chicken and Dumplings

8 chicken breasts
4 boxes chicken broth ( two normal two low sodium)
1 pint light cream
4 tablespoons flour
dill
sage
salt
pepper

dumplings
2 and 1/4 cups bisquick
2/3 of c cup of milk
tablespoon dill ( fresh or frozen)

Boil chicken breasts in two boxes of broth until they are cooked through. Remove chicken breasts and shred them ( I use two forks). Return chicken to broth add in two more boxes of broth. While this is simmering, pour the light cream into an airtight container and add the flour ( sprinkle it over the top of the cream) put the lid on the container and shake the heck out of it. Then add this to the broth and chicken. add sage, dill and pepper to taste.
simmer...

To make the dumplings ( preheat the oven to 450 degrees)
mix bisquick, milk, and dill then plop the dumplings into the boiling chicken mixture.
they will seem small at first but they grow rather quickly once they are in the water.
Put the entire pot into the oven for 15-20 minutes until the dumplings are a little brown on top.
serve into bowls and let cool before eating ( it is really hot).
This recipe was so easy my husband can do it and cooking really isn't his thing.
Well, I just thought I'd share, I am off to do that homework I have been avoiding.

T

Crack Scones

I started working out again for the first time today and what better way to celebrate than with scones and shrimp scampi. Weight loss, what weight loss. The other day I tried this scone recipe and my husband liked them so much that he now calls them crack. And the best part is how easy and fast they are.

I modeled them after the scones at a little Irish Bakery in Melrose, Ma called Breads and Bits of Ireland. If you live in the area and you haven't been, go tomorrow, or better yet early on a Saturday or Sunday morning. They make the best scones and they have a huge variety including chocolate orange, raspberry jam, and lemon poppy seed just to name a few. They also have Irish Soda bread and they do breakfast and lunch there. But I only ever went for the delicious scones. Which last for several days. You can even stick them in the toaster oven when they start to go stale and enjoy them like they are freshBut these are just a few varieties I highly recommend you go and try their greatness for yourself.

But I digress, I made cream scones with Chocolate Chips and Clementine zest. And anyone who tells you that good scones have to have heavy cream is lying to you, I subbed in light cream and they came out just fine. I've moved too far away to get my Breads and Bits of Ireland fix but at least I can console myself with these. More on the shrimp scampi later

Crack Scones
2 cups flour
1 Tablespoon baking Powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 Tablespoons sugar
The zest of one clementine
5 Tablespoons of cold butter cut into 1/2 inch pieces
3/4 cup of chocolate chips
1 cup of light cream

Preheat Oven to 450 degrees and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

Pour the first 4 ingredients into a food processor and pulse three times to mix them. Then place the butter evenly on top of the flour mixture and add the clementine zest. Pulse about 12 times or until the mixture sticks together when you pinch it between your fingers.
Pour the flour/butter mixture into a bowl and mix in the chocolate chips. Finally, using a rubber spatula, lightly mix in the cream. don't worry if there are extra floury bits.

Dump the dough onto a floured surface, floury bits and all, and gently work the dough until it is a ball. Not too much or it will get tough. take out a 9 inch round cake pan and flour the bottom of it. then work the dough into the cake pan until it evenly covers the bottom of the pan. Then dump the dough out onto a floured surface (you might have to give the cake pan a good whack). Cut into eight equal pieces and place them on the parchment paper. Cook for 10-16 minutes (it all depends on your oven). They might get a little dark on the bottom but don't stress this doesn't affect the flavor. You are looking for a nice golden, or a little darker, color on top.

I was tired of making banana bread with my leftover bananas. I love my recipe but it makes two loafs and we can barely eat one in a week. I could freeze the other one but that would require thought and effort on my part. So I decided to try something different. This recipe is my own variation of something I found on cooks.com. This cake came out very light and fluffy and was AWESOME warm. My husband isn't a big banana baked goods fan and he asked for seconds of this cake shortly after it came out of the oven. I don't think it needs icing while it is hot but I am going to test it tomorrow and see if I think it needs some extra umph. I'lll let you know if I decide to ice it next time

Chocolate Chip Banana Cake:

Ingredients:

5/6 cup of butter ( 1 stick plus a third of a cup)

1 1/2 cup of Sugar

1 cup of sour cream ( I used reduced fat)

2 eggs

1 cup of mashed bananas ( 2-3 bananas)

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

2 cups of flour

1 tsp baking soda

1/4 cup of water

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 heaping cup of chocolate chips

-Preheat overn to 350 degrees
- Grease a 9 x 13 glass baking pan.

-Cream butter and sugar in a standing mixer (this will take a while go read a chapter of your book while you wait).

-Once the butter and sugar are creamed add in the eggs and sour cream, mix until well blended. -Add the mashed bananas mix until blended.

-Meanwhile, (you can leave the mixer running) whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Also, put the baking soda into the water to dissolve.

- Add in flour mixture then soda mixture, in that order.

-Add the vanilla last.

- Pour batter into greased pan and bake for 45 minutes to 1 hour.

Ok I am going to go beat my husband up until he gives up control of the wii. (Or maybe I'll read)

Hello and welcome

Hello and welcome to everyone actually reading this, probably just my friends and family.
Well I just finished writing two articles to send off to a publication that I hope will pick them up. I'll post about it if they actually get accepted. I am terribly nervous about them so I had to talk to someone about it. The internet seemed as good a place as any.

So what is this blog about, mostly food, cooking, baking, eating out etc. But occasionally I'll write about writing, or being unemployed or about how my cats are swiftly drowning me in cat hair. Heck, I might even write to do lists on here so that they are somewhere that I can actually find them. So mostly food, but with a little bit of life thrown in. This was conceived by my friend Pam who insisted that I should be writing every day in order to make sure that I don't lose my writing skills while I am unemployed. Ok, well I'm off to clean my house and find some online copy editing exercises to work on in order to try and keep that skill sharp too.
More later.