Instant Pot™ or Pressure Cooker Chicken and Rice Soup

The other day, I decided I wanted a "dump and cook" chicken soup that could be done in the Instant Pot™.  My wife suggested chicken and rice, which was a great idea, since rice normally cooks great under pressure (and in no time at all).

I'll admit the first attempt wasn't perfect.  For reasons I can't explain, I decided to let it release pressure naturally, even though I know very well that rice is a quick-release ingredient.  I also added way too much rice.  The result was mushy and thick, but nonetheless delicious.

The recipe below makes corrections for those two mistakes.  I haven't actually tested it yet, so I present it with caution, but I'm pretty sure it'll work just fine.

Instant Pot™ Chicken and Rice Soup

Note: This recipe uses white rice.  It can be done with brown rice, but the cooking time would need to be longer (about 20-25 minutes).

4 cups low-sodium chicken broth
1 cup water
1 pound of boneless skinless chicken
1/2 cup of white long-grain or jasmine rice
1 large onion
3/4 pound of carrots
2 large ribs of celery
salt and pepper
olive oil

1. Wash, peel, and cut all ingredients into spoon-sized chunks.
2. Switch the cooker to saute on high and heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil in the bottom of the pot.  Saute the vegetables with a pinch of salt until they begin to soften.
3. Add the chicken to the pot, stirring.  Season with salt and pepper.
4. Add the rice, stirring, followed by the liquid.  Make sure all the rice is scraped off the sides and submerged into the liquid.
5. Place the lid on the cooker.  Switch to pressure cooking high pressure and set the timer for 6 minutes.
6. As soon as the cooking cycle completes, perform a quick pressure release.
7. Open the pot carefully, letting steam flow away from you.  Stir the soup and give it a taste.  Adjust seasoning and serve hot with nice crusty bread or cheesy toast.

Instant Pot™ is a trademark that I use and mention without permission from the trademark owner.  Most of my Instant Pot™ recipes can be made in any similar multi-cooker or a stove-top pressure cooker, provided it can handle the settings described in the recipe (typically, high pressure for a designated amount of time plus saute/browning).

Instant Pot or Pressure Cooker Chicken Marsala

I received an Instant Pot™ for Christmas and I've been making dinner in it almost every night for the past week or so.  I might be a little bit obsessed.  Just a little.  ;-)

Last night, I decided it'd be a good idea to convert my Chicken Marsala recipe for the IP.  It came out awesome, though it's not quite the "dump and stir" recipe you might expect for the IP.  In order to maximize flavor and texture, you need to do a fair amount of prep.

Instant Pot Chicken Marsala

Note: This is probably the only occasion where I'm going to say it's okay to buy Cooking Wine from the grocery aisle instead of a good drinking wine.  It makes a perfectly good Marsala sauce.  If you have a nice Marsala, feel free to use it, though you might have to use extra salt and the sauce might come out sweeter.

8-10 oz Baby Bella (Cremini) Mushrooms
1-2 pounds Boneless Chicken
1 large onion
3/4 cup of Marsala Cooking Wine
1 cup water or chicken broth
1 large clove of garlic, minced or pressed
olive oil or butter (about 1/4 cup)
1/3 cup Cornstarch
salt and pepper

1. Thickly slice or quarter the mushrooms.  Chop the onion into a large dice (about 1/2 inch).
2. Switch your multi-cooker to the saute setting and coat the bottom generously with oil or butter.
3. Place 2 tablespoons of the cornstarch into a bowl or measuring cup and add 1/4 cup of water.  Stir thoroughly until no lumps are visible.  Set aside.
4. Place the remaining cornstarch in a shallow bowl or plate.  Season with salt and pepper.  Coat the chicken with cornstarch.
5. Working in batches, so as to not crowd the pan, saute each side of the chicken to develop a firm yellowish crust (it will not completely brown).  You don't want to cook the chicken through.  Just develop the crust.
6. Remove chicken to a plate and add the vegetables to the pot.  Add additional olive oil and a pinch of salt.  Saute vegetables until they start to soften and lose some of their liquid.
7. Add the wine, scraping-up any browned bits on the bottom of the pan.  Simmer for 2-3 minutes to allow some of the alcohol to dissipate (else it will get trapped inside the pot and be kind of boozy).  Add the chicken stock and season with pepper.
8. Nestle the chicken into the liquid and close the lid.
9. Set the valve to closed and set your pot for high pressure and 6 minutes.  Allow the pot to complete the cooking cycle and release the pressure naturally.
10. Open the pot and remove the chicken to a plate again, gently as it may start to fall apart.  press Cancel and Saute.  Bring mixture to a bubble.
11. Stir-in the cornstarch and water mixture, which should thicken the sauce.  If it's too thick or gloppy, add a little water until it's the thickness you like.  Taste and adjust seasoning.
12. Serve chicken and mushroom sauce over rice, pasta, grains like farro, mashed potatoes, polenta, or as-is with a good portion of nice crusty bread to soak-up the sauce.

Tips

• You may find you have a lot of extra gravy and mushrooms after you've served all of the chicken.  This can be frozen or refrigerated and then used as a delicious pasta sauce.
• If you wish to make this recipe faster, try tossing the mushrooms and onions with olive oil and a pinch of salt and microwaving them covered on high for a few minutes instead of sauteing them.  This should serve the same purpose of softening them and removing some of the water and can be done while you're browning the meat.

Instant Pot™ is a trademark that I use and mention without permission from the trademark owner.  Most of my Instant Pot™ recipes can be made in any similar multi-cooker or a stove-top pressure cooker, provided it can handle the settings described in the recipe (typically, high pressure for a designated amount of time plus saute/browning).

Doritos-Crusted Chicken...Wait, What?

I have a confession to make.  I've never eaten at a Taco Bell.  The truth is that I just don't like Mexican style food all that much, so we never went as kids and I don't really eat a lot of fast food as an adult.

That said I do love fried chicken and there's something oddly alluring, if not downright creepy, about these new "inside-out" tacos they've been advertising where they've basically wrapped taco condiments inside of a rolled-up fried chicken patty.  There's something equally alluring and weird about the Doritos-flavored hard taco shells they've been hawking.

And then it hit me...  DING!  Doritos-coated chicken.  OMG.  YES.

I'm going to be honest with you...  It didn't have quite the familiar Doritos-flavored punch I expected it to have.  It turns out that the frying process mutes the seasoning quite a bit.  However, it turns out that crushed tortilla chips make a fantastic, super-crispy coating, so it was a big win anyway.  I think if I were to do this again, I'd probably just use plain tortilla chips (preferably low-salt) or I would use the Doritos and try to bake them instead of frying them.

Doritos-Crusted Chicken Cutlets

1/2 of a large bag of Doritos Chips
1 egg, beaten with 1 tablespoon of water
1 pound of boneless skinless chicken breast or tenders

1. Place chips in a large zip-top bag.  Close the bag, removing as much air as possible.  Using the smooth side of a meat mallot, the bottom of a heavy pan, or a rolling pin, pulverize the chips into uniform crumbs.  Alternatively, you may wish to use a food processor.
2. Pound the chicken pieces flat so they are uniformly about 1/2 inch thick.
3. Bread the chicken pieces by placing them first in the egg wash, then into the crushed chips.  Place each piece on a rack to prevent it from getting soggy.
4. Shallow-fry in oil or bake in a 375 degree oven until golden brown and chicken is cooked-through.

Leftover Turkey Chili

So your Dad and your Aunt Edna are the only ones who eat dark meat at Thanksgiving.  I think we can all sympathize with that (even if we don't all have an Aunt Edna...I don't).  That's why turkey breeders in the U.S. breed birds with massive breasts.  Most of us reach for the white meat (and then thoroughly cover it in a pool of gravy...amiright?).

So what are you supposed to do with all that leftover drumstick and thigh meat?  A 20-pound bird can sometimes yield as much as a 2 to 3 pounds of it and it's usually much darker than dark chicken meat.  For years, I tucked it into the freezer.  I might use a couple pieces here and there in a turkey stew, but my wife usually finds them and picks them out.  Eventually, I'd have a block of unrecognizable freezer-burned brown meat and into the garbage it would go.  What a waste.

Enter my recipe for Turkey or Chicken Chili.  It's a loose interpretation of a recipe from Cook's Illustrated magazine for beef chili made from ground beef.  One day, I discovered that you could swap out the ground meat for chunks of dark meat turkey and by the time it was done stewing-down in tomatoes, it'd taste like rich pulled pork or beef.  A real bonus is that it can be done in the slow cooker.

Leftover Dark Meat Turkey Chili

Notes: The amount and kind of meat is flexible here.  If all you have is a pound and 3/4, that's fine.  If it's over 2 pounds, that's fine, too.  Turkey works well, as does chicken, or even chunks of uncooked pork butt or pork shoulder (you can pull it out, shred it, then put it back in at the end).  You can also mix dark and white meat.

This recipe makes a mild, tomato-flavored chili.  If you like it spicier, double-up on the pepper flakes and cayenne.

2 Pounds Cooked Dark Turkey Meat
2 (15-oz) cans red kidney beans, drained and rinsed
2 (28-oz) cans crushed tomatoes
2 medium onions, chopped coarsely
1 red bell pepper
6 medium cloves garlic, minced

1/4 cup chili powder
1 tablespoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 teaspoon dried oregano
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt, to taste

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

1) In a small bowl, mix the spices (chili powder, cumin, pepper flakes, oregano, cayenne, salt).  Set aside.

2) In a sauté pan, sweat the onions and pepper in oil over medium heat until they begin to soften.  Add the garlic and spices.  Stir well (it'll look like a brown mess), allowing the oil and heat to release the flavors in the spices.  Remove from heat before it burns.

3) Place the meat, beans, vegetable and spice mixture, and tomatoes into a 6-quart slow cooker.  Stir well.  Cook on low 6 to 8 hours until mixture is well cooked and darkens in color.  If it is not thickening and you like a thicker chili, remove the cover during the last hour or two.

4) Serve in bowls with classic chili toppings such as a dollup of sour cream, shredded cheese, or chopped scallions.

Stove-Top Method:

1) For step #2 above, use a heavy-bottom dutch oven instead of a saute pan.

2) For step #3 Pour remaining ingredients into the dutch oven.  Cover, bring to a boil, reduce to a slow simmer and simmer 4 hours.  Uncover, stir, and simmer 3-4 more hours until mixture darkens and thickens.

Using-up Greens: Israeli Couscous With Chicken and Greens

For those of you who live in New England and have gardens or subscribe to a Farm Share, this time of the year is all about greens. MOUNDS and MOUNDS of greens.  Salad greens, bitter greens, kale, swiss chard, and so on.  It comes fast and it comes in plentiful.  I usually plant three 4-packs of lettuce seedlings each year and they all mature at once and threaten to bolt to flower.  Truth be told, I usually end-up giving half away to friends.  However, I'm always looking for recipes for the other half.

This recipe is a good one for those hardier greens that can stand-up to a little cooking like swiss chard, spinach, or kale.  I happened to make it with escarole, a slightly bitter green leaf lettuce in the endive family.  As I've mentioned in the past, it's really popular in soup around here.  However, some nice mature spinach or swiss chard would stand-in nicely.

The bulk of this dish is Israeli Couscous, sometimes called Pearl Couscous.  It's very different from the regular couscous that you're probably used to.  It's basically small toasted pearls of pasta, a little larger than tapioca pearls, and it cooks-up smaller than a baby pea.  Most grocery stores stock it, but if you have trouble finding it, you might try Orzo or Ancini de Pepe.

Israeli Couscous With Chicken and Escarole (or Greens)

Note: I'm going to cross a line here and say that it's okay to use powdered chicken bouillon here.  *GASP*  I know...  This is one of those rare occasions where the salty yellow-colored stuff actually does your dish justice.  However, I've made it with homemade stock and it works just as nicely, if not a little stickier from the natural gelatin.

2-3 large handfuls of greens, roughly chopped
1 1/2 cups Israeli Couscous
2 1/4 cups chicken stock
1/2 onion, finely minced
2 medium carrots, sliced thinly
1 medium boneless skinless chicken breast, cubed
olive oil
salt and pepper to taste


1) In a large saute pan that has a lid, heat a couple tablespoons of olive oil on medium heat.  Add cubed chicken and saute until the chicken begins to brown a bit.

2) Add more oil if needed along with the carrots, onions, and a small pinch of salt.  Saute until the vegetables begin to soften.

3) Add the couscous and a more oil if needed.  Stir constantly, sauteing until the couscous is lightly toasted.  It can begin to brown a little, but do not burn it.

4) Quickly add all of the chicken stock.  Bring to a boil, reduce to low, cover, and let simmer about 10-12 minutes.

5) In the last 2-3 minutes of cooking when the liquid is almost gone, add all the greens and cover the pan so they will wilt.  Once they've wilted a bit, stir them into the couscous.  If things start sticking, add a little water to loosen it up.

6) Taste and adjust the seasoning.  Serve immediately.  A good sprinkle of good Parmesan cheese on top of each dish wouldn't hurt.

All The Chicken You Can Eat

I'm always fascinated by local food traditions. Sometimes, we don't even realize something is a local tradition until we move away. Each geographical location has its own history, its own culture, and often, food traditions develop as a result of the melting of multiple cultures together.

One food tradition in Rhode Island is Chicken dinner served family style. While that may not sound all that special, "Chicken Family Style," as its known, comprises of a series of very special dishes and is served at many Rhode Island restaurants--particularly those with banquet halls. In fact, it's very common, almost expected, to be served Chicken Family Style at weddings and other family celebrations.

Here's how the meal generally goes. First, you're served a simple salad with house Italian dressing along with dinner rolls or bread and butter. Typically, the salad comes in a large bowl and is passed around the table so you can serve yourself (i.e. "Family Style"). Then, they bring out large platters of split roasted whole chicken, piping-hot french fries, and pasta with marinara sauce (shells, penne, or ziti). Again, the platters are passed and you can eat as much as you like. They'll bring more!

Some establishments, in an effort to add their personal touch to the meal, offer additional items. For example, some offer a house chicken soup during the first course. One restaurant is known for adding freshly baked cinnamon rolls to the bread basket, while another is known for offering oven-roasted rosemary potatoes as alongside the fries. In the end, it's all delicious.

It's not entirely clear where the tradition came from, but it's likely that it had to do with one particular restaurant, Wright's Farm, that even today, only serves this signature meal. The restaurant was originally a working chicken farm and the owner built a small restaurant alongside it that slowly grew to the enormous place it is today. In fact, it's even a tourist destination.

While Wright's is likely the the establishment that established Chicken Family Style as a part of Rhode Island Culture, it's likely the heavy influence of the Italians in the area that influenced the meal itself. Italians are known for being family-centric and serving their meals "family style," and it's obvious that the dishes in the meal itself are of Italian influence.

What kinds of food traditions are in your area?

Winter Cooking: Soups, Chowders, and Stews

Here in New England, Mother Nature is up to her old tricks again. We had a couple of weeks after the holidays of decent weather where it wasn't biting cold and we didn't have much in the way of snow or freezing rain. I'd just started thinking we were through the worst of it.

Then, she layed it on thick, with a few good windy storms, some heavy precipitation, and a couple of nights where it felt like 10 below with the wind-chill factor.

Brrr...

Nothing fights back at the winter cold quite like a steaming-hot bowl of soup, chowder, or stew. Soup is one of those wonderful things that I look forward to making each year as the weather gets colder. There's just something special, rustic, and homey about it.

I thought I'd share one of my basic recipes for soup today. Make yourself a batch, ladle-out a big coffee mug of it, and curl-up on the couch with a good book. Enjoy!

Tomato, Veggie, & Chicken Soup
This quick and easy recipe is a great base for what I like to call "refrigerator soup." You can easily clean out the fridge and toss in any veggie leftovers and it'll taste great and be relatively healthy. It's an incredibly flexible soup. Play around with it and enjoy!

1 quart (32oz) chicken broth or stock
1 pint (16oz) water
1 15oz can stewed tomatoes
2 cups pulled or diced cooked chicken
1 medium onion
2 large stalks celery
3 carrots
1 cup (dry) tube, elbow, or egg noodle pasta
1 can red or white beans, rinshed (optional)
olive oil
salt & pepper

1) Pre-cook pasta according to package directions. Rinse and cool.
2) Peel and chop carrots and onions into chunky pieces that are similar in size and will fit on a spoon.
3) Clean and slice celery stalks cross-ways into spoon-sized slices.
4) Heat a heavy-bottom pot on medium-high heat with just enough oil to coat the bottom of the pan. Add onions, carrots, and celery. Stir, cooking until veggies start to soften but do not brown. Adjust heat as necessary. This is an important step for flavor...don't skip it!
5) Add chicken broth, water, tomatoes, and beans. Cover and bring to a boil. Reduce to gently bubbling simmer. Cook until the beans soften slightly and carrots are cooked through.
6) Reduce to a slow simmer. Add chicken and cooked pasta. Simmer 3-5 minutes and serve.

Thoughts On Indoor Grilling...

Living in a 3rd-floor condo, I truly miss grilling. While I'm not one of your grilling die-hards that insists the Weber charcoal-burning kettle is the only way to go, I do enjoy the delicious flavors that come with having a flame touch your food with it's delicate hot fingers. I enjoy the smoky flavor, smell, and the perfect black grid marks on the food. It's a total sensory experience. Throw in an ear of perfectly cooked corn and, well, you've got a barbecue that'll knock your socs off.

For those of us multi-unit dwellers who are forced to respect the city fire code, the cooking appliance and gadget industry has come up with a number of alternatives, some bad, some good. There are "contact grills" (thank you, George Foreman), grill pans, even electric grills. All of them claim to be able to produce those delicious grill marks. In fact, few do...

Contact Grills - I'll admit that George had the right idea when he developed his "Lean, Mean, Grilling Machine," but he fell short mimicking the actual cooking method. I've tried several contact grills from a number of manufacturers and I'm never able to get anything better than flabby chicken with yellow stripes where the grill marks should be and only on one side. Half the time, the top grill never touches the meat. Worse yet, the meat often ends-up being steamed instead of "grilled". And don't get me started on how hard they are to clean unless you have the one model with removable grilling plates.

Electric Grills - I honestly have never tried one. If someone out there has, I'd love to hear your thoughts. Just looking at the things, I'm pretty sure you won't get much better results than a contact grill. There's just no way the heating element can do the kind of damage direct contact with an open flame can do. That, and they must be a pain to clean.

Coated Grill Pans - Basic knowledge of searing technique tells us that grill marks and "crust" are made by having the food in contact with a very hot pan or rack such that it sticks to the metal until the crust is formed. Then, it releases. So, I ask, how would you get good grill marks with a teflon-coated "nonstick" grill pan? The best it can do is put those sad yellow lines on it like the contact grill. Plus, liquid leaks into the troughs between the ridges of the pan and turns into steam, steaming your meat.

My Favorite: Cast Iron Grill Pans - My personal vote goes to cast iron grill pans such as those made by Lodge Cookware. Why? First of all, nothing holds heat like cast iron. If intense heat is what you're after, cast iron is a no-brainer. This intense heat actually makes black grill marks instead of yellow ones. Also, the "grill" ridges are high enough that your food isn't going to come in contact with the valleys between ridges. They're sharp too, not rounded like coated grill pans, so they're going to leave well-defined marks on the food. The best part is that if you run the pan on high, drippings from the meat will drop into the valleys, burn, and actually produce a moderate amount of smoke that goes back up into the food giving it real food flavor. Just don't forget to run the hood fan or you'll smoke yourself out of house and home (and set-off the smoke alarms to boot). My only complaint is the size, but they're so cheap, you could probably buy two.

Tips for Cooking with a Cast Iron Grill Pan

• Even if your pan is "seasoned" at the factory, season it yourself again. It'll make it easier to clean. Coat all surfaces of the pan with vegetable shortening and place the pan upside-down in the oven with a sheet pan covered in aluminum foil on the shelf below it to catch any drippings. Heat the oven to 450 degrees and let the pan "bake" for 15 minutes or so. You will want to open some windows and turn on the hood fan. This will produce smoke.
• Pound the meat with a mallot until it's an even thickness so it cooks evenly. If working with chicken, use the smooth side of the mallot and work until it's about 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick.
• If using a marinade, blot all excess marinade off the meat with a paper towel before grilling. Most marinades have a lot of sugar in them that will burn too soon and actually fuse itself to your pan. It's not easy to remove and you'll have more smoke than necessary.
  
• If using dry rubs or simple dry seasoning, blot the meat dry with paper towels. Add a bit of oil to the meat and put the dry rub on top of that. Let it sit for a few minutes to improve flavor (or refrigerate up to 4 hours).
• Pre-heat the pan on your stove's largest hob on the highest setting. Do not oil the pan. It'll only produce smoke. Add the meat and sear on both sides to get your grill marks. If the meat is thick, reduce the heat to medium and cook the meat through. Alternatively, place the entire pan in a hot oven to finish cooking the meat to the desired temperature.
• Clean your pan while still warm using a stiff wire brush like this one. Scrape any stubborn char off with the back (wood) side of the brush. After it cools, rinse the pan with water and a small bit of dish soap to get the black bits out of the pan. Wipe thoroughly with a paper towel to remove any further residue and dry thoroughly. Exposed iron will rust if left wet.
• Die hard cast iron enthusiasts tell you never to scrape the pan with metal or wash with soap because it'll ruin the seasoning--the black coating formed by use that gives the pan its non-stick feature and prevents rusting. In the case of the grill pan, I make an exception, as I don't really want chunks of burnt food becoming part of the "seasoning". As long as you oil your pan properly after cleaning (see below), you won't have a problem with the seasoning.
  
• After every use, pour a small amount of vegetable oil into the pan and rub it into the pan with a paper towel. A slightly warm pan will absorb the oil better. Let it sit until it dries a bit before storing.

Recipe: Cast-Iron Grilled Chicken

2-4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
seasoning or dry rub of your choice (lemon pepper, cajin, garlic + pepper, etc.)
salt
olive oil

1) Cover each chicken breast with a piece of plastic wrap and pound with the flat side of a mallot until chicken is 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick. Pound from the center, pushing outwards.
2) Place chicken on a plate or plastic board. Blot dry, then add olive oil to the top surface. Sprinkle generously with your spice rub and salt. Turn chicken over and repeat. Let sit with rub for about 5 minutes.
3) While chicken rests, heat the grill pan on your stove's highest setting. Use the hood fan to cut-back on smoke.
4) Place the chicken pieces on the grill pan with a pair of tongs, being sure to not place them too close or they'll steam. If cooking 4 breasts, work in two batches. The chicken should immediatly make a sizzling sound and stick to the pan. Let it stick for at least two minutes.
5) When the chicken releases from the pan, turn it a quarter turn to make a grid pattern on the underside of the meat. Sear another 1-2 minutes.
6) Turn chicken over and sear the other side as you did in step 5. Turn the heat down to medim-high and cook chicken until it registers 160-165 on a meat thermometer. Remove with tongs and serve.

Thrifty Cooking: "The Whole Chicken, and Nothing But the [Whole] Chicken"

This is one of a series of blog entries that will deal with the idea of "thrifty cooking". In these terrible economic times, when people are getting layed-off by the hundreds, we can all save a lot of money by going back to some of the skills our grandparents had in the kitchen. All it takes is a little time and a bit of confidence. I'll show you how to turn an inexpensive cut of meat into three family meals, or how to make the most out of inexpensive pantry ingredients like rice and dried legumes.

It really bothers me to pay $1.99 (on-sale) to $3.99 (not on-sale) per pound for boneless skinless chicken breast when whole chickens go on sale for 69-99 cents per pound on a pretty regular basis. Sure, I do it from time to time, but I despise it. Chicken bones don't weight a whole lot and they can actually be used to save more money, so you're really getting a better deal with the whole bird--even if you're not a fan of the dreaded "dark meat." If you know what you're doing, you can get 2-3 meals out of one bird at less than $5.

Some people have problems dealing with raw chicken. I'm not sure why. I mean, sure, I don't like to "meet" my food alive before I cook it (embarrassingly, I make the guys at the store steam my lobsters). Chicken arrives quite dead and quite headless (at least, outside of Chinatown). It's really no different than any other piece of meat. It's not going to get-up and walk away on you or make little "help me" chicken noises (mine do, but that's in my head). Try and think of it as a piece of rubber or anything you're comfortable handling. If you don't want to touch it, but you can handle looking at it, buy some food safe latex gloves.

So how about those three meals I promised?

Magic Meal #1 - Roast Chicken.
No, I'm not talking about that dried-up sawdust thing your mother made in 1983 when the USDA still recommended cooking chicken to 190 degrees. I'm talking about a finger-licking, lip-smacking, juicy chicken with gravy and mashed potatoes--the kind that will have you continuing to pick at the serving platter long after your stomach started protesting that it's too full because, well, it's just so darned good!

One of my favorite and most simple recipes is "French-Style Chicken In a Pot". The basic idea is that it cooks long and slow in a covered pot in its own juices, making the best darned gravy starter anyone could ever hope for. You DO NOT need a $300 Le Creuset French Oven to pull this off. Any oven-safe/stovetop-safe covered pot will work--even a pasta pot if it fits in your oven. In a pinch, grab the ceramic crock insert from your slow cooker (I know you have one...it's in the back of your cupboard and only comes out once a year to make chili or baked beans). Remove any plastic from the lid or choose another lid that fits tightly and do your browning in a frying pan (ceramic and stovetops don't mix). Transfer the chicken to the pot, add the veggies, lid it up, and stick it in the oven. Don't skip the browning step. That's flavor!

Now, here's the first real trick. When the chicken is done, don't serve it on the bone--we need those bones! Carve it and serve the meat. Drizzle some of the gravy or liquid from the bottom of the pan over the meat on the serving platter--it'll make it seem juicier and add to that finger-licking quality.

Magic Meal #2 - The Yellow Elixer of Life
Once you're stuffed, pick any and all of the remaining meat off the chicken carcass. Don't go crazy, but get as much good-sized meat as you can. Put that in a zip-top baggie and store it in the fridge or freezer. Take the bones and put them into a stock pot or, better yet, a pressure cooker (see below). Trim and peel a carrot, break it in 3 and throw that in the pot. Throw in 1-2 stalks of celery cleaned and broken into chunks. Take the skin off half a large onion, cut into large chunks, and throw that in too. Toss in a bay leaf or two, a couple cloves of garlic, and some black pepper. Cover the whole mess with water--just enough to cover the bones.

Stock Pot Method - Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer. Simmer for about 2 hours. I'm sure Julia Child, may she rest in peace, is shaking her finger at me from above, but you honestly don't need 8+ hours. Two hours at a gentle bubble will do just fine.

Pressure Cooker Method - If you have a pressure cooker, you're in luck! Make sure your bones and water aren't more than 3/4 of the way up the side of the pot (or above any max fill line in your cooker). Lid-up the pressure cooker, bring to full pressure on high heat (read your instruction manual for this), then adjust the heat and cook at 15 psi for 45 minutes. Let the pressure drop naturally. That's right, homemade chicken stock in less than an hour. Beat that! For those of you who are skeptical, I'll do a rant on the virtues of a pressure cooker in a separate post.

Once everything cools down a bit, strain the whole mess with a fine mesh strainer (or your pasta strainer) and place your broth into the fridge in a covered bowl overnight to congeal (like Jello). Discard the solid matter. The next day, skim-off any solid fat on the top of the broth and discard. Transfer the chicken broth into a gallon zip-top bag or other container and freeze.

Congratulations! You just made 98% fat free, low-sodium chicken stock for FREE instead of paying $1 per can at the store and there's no MSG or other junk in this one.

Magic Meal #3 - The Real Magic
You are now armed with two ingredients that can be used for 1 or 2 more meals, depending on how much left-over chicken you have. The best part of this is that you're using byproducts of a previous meal, so you're feeding your family for nearly zilch. Not too shabby, huh? Here are some suggestions:

- Chicken Salad Sandwiches
- Chicken Noodle Soup
- Chicken Caesar salad or salad wraps
- Chicken Stew or Chicken Corn Chowder
- More chicken and mashed potatoes (use the stock to make gravy)
- Chicken Gumbo
- Creamy "Chicken & Rice"
- Chicken Tacos or Quesadillas

Enjoy!