Grilled Chicken Marinated in Cumin, Lemon, and Mint

Can I just say how great it feels to be running again after months of not doing it?  It's wonderful!  But now I'm out of shape, so...working on that.

Here is a really simple, light, and tasty chicken recipe for your summer/fall transition.

Ingredients:

Juice and zest of 1 lemon.

1 pound bone-in chicken thighs, trimmed

5-6 garlic cloves, minced

1/4 cup mint leaves, finely minced

1 t. paprika (preferably hot)

1 t. cumin

2 T. olive oil

Salt & pepper to taste

Instructions:

Whisk together lemon juice, zest, half of the garlic, half of the mint, and all the spices in a bowl.  Pour into a container or Ziploc bag for marinating.  Marinate at least 30 minutes at room temperature, or longer in the fridge.

Preheat your grill on high heat.  Place chicken on the grill (discard marinade) and cook about 5-6 minutes on each side (or until done through).

Place on a platter and allow to rest for 5 minutes.  Sprinkle with remaining garlic and mint.  

Margarita Pork Chops with Crispy Quinoa Salad

Ingredients:

3 pork chops, flattened to about 1 inch thick

1/4 cup tequila
1/4 cup lime juice (about 2 limes' worth)
Juice of 1 orange
1/2 t. salt
1/2 t. pepper
1 T. your favorite spice rub (mine was leftover from this recipe)
2 chipotles in adobo (adjust to your tastes), minced
1 T. honey

Instructions:

Mix together marinade spices in a large bowl or ziploc bag.  Add pork chops, coat, and allow to sit for 8 hours or more, shaking up the marinade/chops a couple of times to evenly distribute again.

Heat a grill over high heat.  Add pork chops and sear (for those perfect grill marks!) for 6 minutes.  Turn down the heat to medium and continue cooking for another 6-15 minutes (depending on how thick your chops are, mine took FOREVER) until almost done throughout.

Allow to rest for 10 minutes, tented with foil.

Serve hot with your choice of sauce (I used salsa verde and Sriracha!) and enjoy!

The recipe for the quinoa salad can be found here.  I follow it exactly, no changes except perhaps adding a few more veggies!  Very versatile and refreshing.

Bomb Collins

Sometimes you have a really bad day.

Or, for me, a really bad morning.  Not enough sleep (for a few days), hormonal, bitchy.  Just one of those no-good, no-fun, not-feeling-life-at-all, please-just-let-me-stay-in-bed-all-day mornings.  You blow up at everyone and everything, you cry, you're not feeling like *yourself*, and (in true angst-fashion) no one *gets you*.

Therefore, dammit, in my world, you need and deserve a drink.

But not just any drink!

A nice drink.  A fancy drink.  A drink recipe you saved last week because it just looked THAT GOOD.

So, this afternoon, I splurged and went and got everything for it (Angostura Bitters, what is THIS?) while Charles was out and have been preparing the simply syrup and everything for it.  

It's an appropriate farewell to the summer peaches that I hardly got to savor, as well (insert massive sad face here-- D: ).  (HOW IS IT ALMOST FALL ALREADY?!?!?!)

Now, the blog I found this on is gorgeous and I followed the recipe to a T, so I feel like I'm plagiarizing if I retype it here.  So, here you go, the Bomb Collins!

The flavors of the drink.

By the way, you can proceed to eat the peach out of the bottom of your glass when you're done...so that makes it healthy, right? ;)

Beautiful peaches.

Steeping the simple syrup.

The Bomb Collins.

Mango-Strawberry Crumble

I had a ton of way-over-ripe (about to go bad) mangos in my fridge and was searching for something to make with them.  I sort of made this up as I went along--take measurements with a grain of salt!  It came out really great, and vanilla ice cream is a perfect addition to it.

Ingredients:

Filling
2 very ripe mangos, cubed (should be about 2-3 cups of mango flesh, my mangos were massive)
15-20 strawberries, hulled and sliced (about 1.5 cups)
2 tablespoons of sugar (adjust depending on your tastes, I don't find that mangos and strawberries need a lot of extra sugar)
Juice of 2 limes, or 1 lemon
1 T. cornstarch or other starch
1 t. cinnamon

Topping
1 recipe gluten-free pie crust (I had one premade)
1/2 cup coarsely ground almonds
1/2 cup brown rice flour
1 t. cinnamon
1/4 cup brown sugar

Instructions:

Butter a square 8x8 baking pan.  Preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.

Toss together the filling ingredients in a bowl and pour into the pan.

Combine the topping ingredients in another bowl and crumble them together with your fingers until they're in small chunks.  Sprinkle evenly over the filling.

Bake in your preheated oven for 35-45 minutes, until the filling is cooked and the topping is well-browned.




....we ate it before I could take pictures.  It was delicious.

Greek-Inspired Chicken Burgers with Homemade Tzatziki

...and chickpeas braised with radish greens and spinach!

We had another sausage-making adventure this weekend (Charles had a few friends over to watch a videogame tournament final) and they were fantastic!  We used this recipe, but next time I will up some of the flavorings.  While it was delicious, I wish the sun-dried tomato flavor had been far more pronounced.  And the cheese kept melting out of the sausages on the grill!

I also made this very refreshing quinoa salad to go with it, which was a big hit, even among the men!  Quinoa is not one of my favorite things, as I often find it very bland.  But this came out very flavorful with a great crunch!  Definitely going in my mental book of things I will make over and over again.

A fun weekend was had by all, and I hope that you all had a great Labor Day!  I managed to run/walk a mile yesterday and today with no worsening foot pains, so hopefully *knockonwood* I'm on the road to total recovery!

Now, after a weekend of semi-indulgent eating and drinking (mostly the drinking part--GF beer, you will be my downfall!), I'm looking to make something lighter.  Yesterday morning, it was an omelette that was essentially a ton of vegetables with a little bit of egg mixed it (and, of course, Sriracha dumped on top).  Didn't eat lunch (one of those odd days where you're just not hungry at all), had the tiny bit of that quinoa salad left for a snack, and then leftovers for dinner.  Today, chicken burgers!

Chicken Burger

Ingredients:

1 pound of ground chicken or turkey (I home-ground 3 boneless, skinless chicken breasts)
1 T. dried oregano
1 T. fresh basil, minced
2 green onions, finely chopped
3 garlic cloves, crushed (I, for once, used my garlic press to get a paste-like consistency)
1/4 cup feta cheese, crumbled
1 t. lemon juice, plus a little zest
2 T. red wine vinegar
1 T. Kalamata olives, finely minced (I did not have these, but they're in the original recipe)
1 t. brine from olives
Black pepper to taste

Buns and toppings

Instructions:

Mix all ingredients for the patties together in a bowl.  Cover and let marinate in the fridge for an hour.

Divide into four equal patties.

Preheat your grill, broiler, or stovetop grill-pan to medium-high heat and cook for 10 minutes, flipping halfway through, or until juices run clear.

Top with tzatziki and your other toppings and enjoy!

Tzatziki

Ingredients:

1 head of garlic (yes, one HEAD of garlic...you can reduce that if you're not a garlic-nut like me!)
1 500-g container of Greek yogurt (thickest you can find)
1 English cucumber, seeded and peeled (if you so desire, I didn't)
2 T. red wine vinegar
1 T. lemon juice (start there, add more if you wish)
Salt & pepper, to taste

Many recipes include a bunch of parsley and mint, but I didn't have either on-hand.

Instructions:

Process the garlic and cucumber in a food processor until finely minced (use liquids from the recipe to aid in the processing).  Also, add herbs, if you are using them.

In some cheesecloth or a fine strainer, squeeze out all the water possible from the cucumber.

Mix everything together in a small-to-medium bowl and cover, refrigerating for at least an hour.  Taste after letting it sit, and correct any flavors to your taste.

Eat it on burgers, sandwiches, use it as dip, etc!

Braised Chickpeas with Radish Greens and Spinach

So, I bought some radishes over the weekend, and they came with a large bunch of greens attached.  I thought, "I can't just throw this out!  This has to be edible!" Lo and behold, it is!  Others compare to flavor to that of other bitter greens, like Swiss chard or kale, so use accordingly.

Ingredients:

1 T. olive oil
1 can chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1 bunch radish greens (or other greens!), washed and dried
1 cup baby spinach, washed and dried
2 shallots (or 1 large), finely chopped
1/2 cup chicken broth
1/2 cup dry white wine
Juice and zest of 1 lemon

Instructions:

Heat 1 T. oil in a deep saute pan over medium heat.  Cook shallots until translucent, then add lemon zest.

Add in chickpeas and saute for a minute or two.

Add in your liquids and bring to a simmer.  Allow liquid to cook down for about 10 minutes, and then add the greens. (I did the opposite and my greens ended up way overcooked).  Salt & pepper to your tastes.

Dinner is served!  Really, really delicious and healthy!