Teriyaki Chicken Bowl

Driving along today, I was having a familiar internal monologue, "What do I do with freakin' chicken today?"  As most of you know, I can get into my "I hate chicken and am so bored to death with chicken" mindset very easily.  As I ran through past recipes in my mind, I had a thought of something else.  Thank God!

Teriyaki chicken rice bowls! 

I mixed up a simple marinade of lemon, soy sauce, hot sauce, oil, garlic and ginger. I scored my chicken breasts and got them marinating for a few hours.  Next step was preparing the teriyaki sauce.  In a small saucepan, I combined the following and brought to a boil.  Once boiling, turn off the heat and let it boil by itself for 1 minute.  Strain it (easier to do this while it's still hot) and set aside to cool.  

• 1/4 c. water
• 3 Tbs brown sugar
• 1 Tbs cornstarch (or flour)
• 1/4 tsp grated fresh ginger
• 1/4 tsp minced garlic
• 1/4 c. soy sauce
• 1/8 c. apple cider vinegar
• 1 Tbs honey

Next, I marinated some edamame in Mirin and prepared some scallions with a  light coat of oil.

Now, I will admit to one short-cut here. I used a pre-made, frozen vegetable fried rice by Innovasian as the base.  Grilled the scallions and chicken, glazing the chicken with the teriyaki.  Then, Viv and I built the bowls with rice, grilled/charred scallion, sliced grilled teriyaki chicken, edamame and toasted sesame seeds, all drizzled with a sriracha mayo we mixed up.  Such a great change for our lowly chicken!  The crunch of the sesame was a fantastic textural element and I must say, the sriracha mayo was just perfect. I hope you may decide to give this a try. Definitely helped us with the chicken doldrums!

Hot Diggity Dog

It's not an every day or even an every month occasion, but who doesn't love a good hot dog?  And I mean, a GOOD hot dog.  That's the key.  When I was a kid, my mom would only buy Oscar Mayer because they were all beef.  All of the giant packages of hot dogs in the store that were either tan or red never made it across the threshold of our house.  (It was always funny, and never got old, to sneak a big pack of red dogs in the grocery basket for mom to discover at the checkout.  &%#dammit girls!) 

Now that I have a child, I've become even pickier about hot dogs. I fell in love with Sabrett's at a hot dog cart a few years ago.  Then I actually paid attention to the commercial for Hebrew National and thought, hmmm, I like what I'm hearing.  So, I tried those and fell in love with them too.  Just recently, I finally had a Nathan's at a friend's house and, well, I think you know what I'm about to say.  So, a good quality hot dog is a must or this whole thing is an exercise in futility.  

Next, how you cook it.  We could debate this all day long.  I recently saw a post about cooking dogs in the crockpot and the comment was "tastes just like they were cooked on a roller."  Ok, is it just me?  That doesn't sell me. Rollers just remind me of those mystery meat dogs slowly riding the convenience store ferris wheel.  Boiling?  Some love it, but I don't think that's the best method either.  At least not by itself. I've always been a fan of grilling them.  And I mean grilling them.  A little char is a must and if they wrinkle a little after they come off the fire, even better! My husband boils them first then grills them for me and they are fantastic.  My friend's Eugenie's husband Mike is also a master dog griller.

Toppings.  This is the biggest area of variation on the planet. Or, close to it.  Everyone has their preference here and that's perfectly ok.  Here's mine:  mustard inside the bottom of bun, followed by some Frank's hot sauce, then the dog, a sprinking of onion, then more mustard, more hot sauce and finished with CHILI.  If you ask me, a hot dog without chili is just a waste of time.  Why bother?  The only other thing I like to add occasionally is sauerkraut but I never leave off the chili.

Which brings me to the subject of this post.  I know, finally.

It's all about chili.  Hot dog chili is not the same as a big bowl of chili.  Two completely different animals altogether.  But making it from scratch can be a challenge.  I once followed a Tyler Florence "ultimate" recipe and it was the most awful, sweet, ketchupy sauce on the planet.  I've fiddled around with this chili issue, read tons of recipes and finally have concocted what I think is the best chili the world has ever known.  And, I'm going to share it with you.

I had 3 big ol' grilled cheeseburgers that were left over from our cookout.  I put them in my food processor to get the meat finely chopped.  This is key!  Then, I put all this together:

• 1/3 cup water
• about 12 oz tomato sauce
• 1/2 cup ketchup
• 2 1/2 teaspoons chili powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
• 3 dashes Worcestershire sauce
I mixed this all together on the stove and added the grilled ground beef.  I let it get to a boil, stirring frequently, then turned it down and let it simmer about 10  minutes.  

OMG! Neil and I both think what really made this a stand-out was the fact that I used the already grilled burgers rather than starting with raw meat.  The grilled flavor was pronounced and just gave the chili that "je ne sais quois." Now I told you already that having hot dogs isn't a frequent occurrence around here.  But what's even more infrequent is having more than one.  This stuff was so great, I ate 2 Nathan's dogs, dressed as described above, last night. 

And I don't care who knows it. 

I'd walk the plank for a good flank

Have you noticed how difficult it is to find a flank steak in your grocery store these days?  I don't think I've seen them in my store for over a year.  Once upon a time, the flank steak got a really bad rap.  It was considered an "inferior" cut of meat, tough, cheap.  I pity the fool who believes that.  Flank steak is one of my favorites.  You can grill it, broil it, make sandwiches out of it, make steak tacos, a simple steak dinner...the list goes on and on.  So, somewhere along the line, other people discovered this and flank steak was pretty plentiful, but as usual, as it's reputation improved, its prices rose.  However, now it's virtually impossible to find it.  Virtually.

On the way back from Asheville yesterday, we stopped at Costco.  (Don't even think about getting me started about how I'd sell my soul to the devil for a Costco and my blood-boiling outrage that the capital city of this state is deprived of one!!!!) There, in the meat department was a beautiful flank steak.  Wait, check that...this package was housing TWO of these beauties.  And, since it's Costco, the price was awesome.  My mom and I selected one and split the spoils.

Tonight I made one of my most favorite flank steak recipes...yes, this is one I've made more than once.  It's from one of my old Weight Watchers cookbooks.  

These cookbooks are the bomb-diggity!

It's simply fantastic and if you can get your hands on a flank steak, I recommend you try this one.  My child raved and gave me the coveted "Ten thumbs up" as she calls it.

Sesame Soy Marinated Flank Steak

• 1 1-1/2 lb flank steak
• 1/4 cup finely chopped green onions
• 1/4 cup soy sauce
• 2 Tbs sugar
• 2 Tbs sherry
• 1 Tbs sesame oil
• 1 Tbs water
• 1/4 tsp pepper
• 4 garlic cloves, minced

Trim the fat from the steak.  Combine the next 8 ingredients in a large ziploc bag.  Add steak, seal the bag and marinate about 8 hours, turning occasionally.

Prepare your grill.  Remove steak from the bag and save the marinade.  Grill steak about 7 minutes per side, using reserved marinade to baste.  Let steak rest at least 5 minutes before slicing it ACROSS the grain into thin slices.  Trust me...if you don't cut it this way, you just wasted your time.

Hot off the grill and resting

Our meal tonight:  grilled flank steak, broiled zucchini & sauteed corn

  Oh yeah...for those of you here in my town.  If you find flank steak in your grocery, please let me know where.

 

Simplicity

This time year often calls for the simplest preparation.  It's hot. Damn hot.  And it's not uncommon for us Southerners to feel sticky, damp and slightly brain damaged by the end of the day.  So, there are those days when a simple supper is best.  I remember as a kid having true garden dinners; like butter beans, rice, fresh tomatoes, cucumbers and corn.  Today felt like one of those days. 

I was not planning to blog about this meal because I just didn't find it all that noteworthy.  BUT...I made the Vivver's plate and she said "Wow!  Mommy, that looks great.  You need to take a picture of this one for sure!"  Well, there you have it.  How could I not oblige?  The wunderkind has been paying attention.

So, tonight we dined on some simple favorites.  I grilled a center cut ham steak.  If you've never grilled ham like this, you're missing out.  Then on the side we had fresh corn-on-the-cob and peas with mint from our patio garden.  That's it.  Nothing more.  Not terribly exciting, but man, it was good!

Here's Viv's plate that she wanted to share with you all:

Not a gourmet feature, but it was some good, satisfying chow!