Hey ya’ll,  Katie here. Last night I tried my hand at Chicken Carbonara, which I’ve read about a lot, but can’t remember if I’ve ever tried. So, in looking through blogchef.net and the bookmarks I’ve placed on that page while at work yesterday, I figured I’d try it out. Here’s the recipe:

All Finished up!

Ingredients:
1lb boneless skinless chicken breasts (cut into bit size pieces)
½ lb bacon
12 ounces spaghetti noodles
½ cup parmesan cheese
2 eggs
¼ cup heavy cream
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon pepper
¼ cup white wine
¼ cup chicken broth
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 cup frozen peas

Cooking Instructions:

Step 1: In a small bowl mix together parmesan cheese, eggs, heavy cream, salt and pepper. In another bowl mix together wine, chicken broth and lemon juice. Set both aside.

Step 2: Bring a pot of water to a boil for cooking the noodles.
Step 3: In a large skillet cook bacon in batches until crispy. Drain on paper towels.

Cooking the bacon

Step 4: Fry chicken pieces in bacon fat until fully cooked. Drain on paper towels.
Step 5: Deglaze the pan with wine mixture scraping up any bits on the bottom of the pan. Cook for about 2-3 minutes. Place noodles in boiling water and cook according to package directions.

Step 6: While noodles are cooking crumble bacon slices into bits and in a large bowl mix chicken, bacon bits, wine glaze mixture, and parmesan/egg mixture. Drain noodles and shake to get rid of any extra water.

Cooked Chicken, and the sauce

Step 7: Add peas and egg mixture to piping hot noodles and mix well

Suggestions, ideas, changes:

- We don’t like peas, so I substituted them for finely chopped bunches of steamed broccoli.

-I chopped my bacon into pieces before I put it in the pan. I found it cooked more evenly, and it was easier to keep an eye on. I’m infamous for burning bacon. But not this time!

- We don’t have white wine in the house, and instead of buying a bottle that we’ll never drink, I just used an extra 1/4c chicken broth.

- My sauce wasn’t as thick as I had planned, so that sort of was a bummer. I think I added too much cream and/or chicken broth.

-Don’t freak out about the raw eggs in the sauce. It’s a common way to thicken sauces, and when you pour it over super hot noodles (basically as soon as you drain them, coat ‘em) it cooks the eggs, but you don’t end up with chunky scrambled-eggs-sauce. Unless you’re into that sort of thing.

-I added crushed basil to my sauce, it lent itself to a little bit more flavor.

The chicken was nice and moist, the sauce had a nice lemony flavor to it, while not being over powering. Serving this with breadsticks is almost a necessity. Ryan took the left overs today for lunch, so I guess he liked it pretty well. I’ll admit, I ate more than my share at dinner, since I was absolutely starving. And, since we had the bacon out for this, we cooked it up and made BLT’s for the day-after lunch.

Hey, ya’ll, it’s Katie, once again! First, before I start this post on my expierence making sushi while I was in Connecticut, I’d like to share a post from postsecret.com that really reminded me of myself, and thought I’d throw it out there, since this is a food blog. And you know you do the same thing!

Okay, now, on to the cooking.

For Christmas, I was given a book on sushi by my roommate, Cynthia, who has often accompanied me to Fujiyama’s in Beckley to dine on sushi, since it remains the one thing I can’t seem to get Ryan to eat.  So, being from a coastal state, I kew the fish in West Virginia wasn’t sushi quality, and I automatically thought of the Fish Market, in downtown Willimantic. It’s a small, local place, that has always had good seafood. So, I packed up my book, and brought it to CT with me on vacation.

After flipping through the photos for a few days, I went with a recipe that called for salmon of all fishes. So I went to the market, discussed my plan with the worker, and even had her skin the fish for me. She bid me good luck, and said it was a good choice to come to a specialty store for it, as nothing you’d get at a grocer would be of good enough quality to promise no food-borne illnesses! If you’re going to try this at home, be sure to get a really good grade fish!

I made a few different types of sushi, but we’ll only be talking about the salmon and asparagus sushi, with mayo, as well as the crabstick, shiitake, and asparagus sushi. Here is a recipe from Alton Brown on how to make sushi rice:

Ingredients

• 2 cups sushi or short grain rice
• 2 cups water, plus extra for rinsing rice
• 2 tablespoons rice vinegar
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 1 tablespoon kosher salt

Directions

Place the rice into a mixing bowl and cover with cool water. Swirl the rice in the water, pour off and repeat 2 to 3 times or until the water is clear.

Place the rice and 2 cups of water into a medium saucepan and place over high heat. Bring to a boil, uncovered. Once it begins to boil, reduce the heat to the lowest setting and cover. Cook for 15 minutes. Remove from the heat and let stand, covered, for 10 minutes.

Combine the rice vinegar, sugar and salt in a small bowl and heat in the microwave on high for 30 to 45 seconds. Transfer the rice into a large wooden or glass mixing bowl and add the vinegar mixture. Fold thoroughly to combine and coat each grain of rice with the mixture. Allow to cool to room temperature before using to make sushi or sashimi.

To make the sushi, you lay out the seaweed wraps that you have picked up (I lucked out, and on the way to the Fish Market, there is an Asian grocery, where I was able to pick up toasted Nori, wasabi, and rice vingear for a VERY good price) on top of a bamboo rolling mat. On top of that, you lay your rice. HINT: Keep your fingers wet, but not soaking so the rice won’t stick to you, and will move nicely along the mat, covering as much area as you can. At the end closest to you, dab a TINY amount of wasabi along the edge. I mean, SMALL amount. I thought I’d put just a little on there, and I was pouring tears because it was so hot, even without wasabi in my soy sauce!

Everything all set out!

You have to slice the fish really thinly, sort of like if you were making those fire-starting matchsticks. If you don’t do it thinly enough, it won’t roll properly.  Anyway, I found it is easier to stack all the larger things together first, then add the smaller things. For example:

Cook asparagus for 2-3 minutes in a frying pan that has water simmering in it, so they are not hard. They should be tender, but have some crunch to them.

Remove from heat, and set aside.

On top of spread rice, add a small amount of mayo on top of wasabi, then add slices of salmon, followed by asparagus, length wise across the nori.

For the crabstick sushi:

Heat a Tablespoon of oil in a pan, then add in thinly sliced shiitake mushrooms. Cook until slightly tender, don’t over-cook them. Pat dry on a paper towel. On the wasabi side of the nori, add a crabstick, then lay asparagus on top of the crab. Add a  line of mushrooms to the side of the crab, facing the rice.

Now, you’re ready to roll it.

Hold the nori in place with the tips of your fingers, and grab the bamboo mat with your thumbs under the edge. The hard part is coming next. You have to keep a firm hold on the filling, so it doesn’t get pushed out. Use even pressure to get the rice to stick to the filling, as well as the nori. Roll the nori to the rice, but be sure the bamboo mat doesn’t get mixed up in there, too.

Hopefully, you’ll end up with this!:

The best part? You can add anything you like to it. I made another roll with carrots, crab, and avocado. As long as the flavor works with the rice, you can go to town. Nori freak you out? Leave it out! Add the rice as a base to a bowl, and layer on all the other yummy things. The book said that’s actually more common form of sushi for people to eat, instead of the rolls! Imagine that!