Beef Cutlets

    One of my favorite comfort foods is breaded beef cutlets. I picked up some cutlets cut from sirloin at Spera’s on Sunday night. I have said this before on my sandwich blog: Spera’s has the best meat around, whether it is cold cuts, beef, chicken, pork, or anything else they carry. The package I bought had a little over 6/10ths a pound which was perfect for the two of us. Six sand dollar sized pieces were cut to about a quarter of an inch in thickness. For the breading, I use Italian style bread crumbs which you can buy in any grocery store. If you just have regular bread crumbs like I did, just add some Italian seasoning, onion powder, garlic powder, and some extra parsley. Use one egg per pound of cutlets to moisten them enough for the bread crumbs to stick. I added a bit of milk to the egg instead of water when making the egg wash just as a personal preference. Heat up about three tablespoons of olive oil in a large skillet and add the cutlets after breading them. Since the cutlets come so thin, I only cook them for about 3 minutes on each side at a medium high heat. Do NOT turn your attention away from them because they can burn very easily. Mine came out to the dark brown I was looking for.

     For sides I had pierogies and mixed vegetables. The mixed vegetables were the steam in bag type so I didn’t do anything extra to them. The pierogies were also frozen but I decided instead of baking them like I normally do, I would sauté them per suggestion of my co-workers. So like most of the stuff I make, I started by sautéing some minced garlic in olive oil and then added the pierogies. They cooked for about 12 minutes which heated them through but didn’t give them the crunch that I had hoped for. Since the cutlets were already out of the pan and onto the plates, I had to pull the pierogies before they could crisp up.

     The pierogies were soft but tasted fine and the garlic added some extra flavor. I don’t think I will sauté them again without adding more to the pan like onions. The beef cutlets came out just the way my mom makes them which is how I wanted them to come out. The meat was tender but cooked through to the point there was little to no pink in any of them. The breading stayed together for the most part; more oil would have ensured that. The simple breading mixture used in this dish can be used on any meat really but it is just the best on beef cutlets. No changes are need to these cutlets, just more practice in the act of making them.

Rating: Yummy - A quick and easy comfort food.

Shepherd's Pie

     Shepherd’s Pie is a very involved dish with many ingredients and many dishes needed to make it. Because I was short on time and wanted to eat before 7, Christine was nice enough to assist me make this dish. I peeled about 2 pounds of potatoes while Christine chopped up a green pepper. Once I got a pot of water boiling, I threw the potatoes in and was lucky enough to be the one to chop up the onion. Tears welled up in my eyes as I was cutting the onion as Christine started peeling 3 carrots. I heated up some olive oil in a pan and sautéed about a teaspoon of minced garlic before adding the pepper, onion, and ground beef. I was waiting on the carrots but they joined the party a few minutes later. While the vegetable and beef mixture began to cook, I made a roux to start my gravy in small sauce pan. I melted two tablespoons of butter and added two tablespoons of flour. Once that was fully mixed, I added a cup of beef broth and two tablespoons of Worcestershire sauce. I dropped the heat to low and let that thicken up.

     Matt showed up around 6:30 and we weren’t even close to done so I had him join in on the fun and finish the mashed potatoes for me. I have never made the mashed potatoes like I did last night but they came out great so I think I will be making them like this from now on, but I will keep making changes until they are perfect. Once Matt had mashed the potatoes I added one egg yolk, ½ cup of chicken broth, two tablespoons sour cream and about a cup of Colby jack/cheddar cheese. Using a hand mixer, Matt mixed them up until they were silky smooth. Corn isn’t yet in season so I used a steamer bag from the frozen section and cooked that in the microwave.

     Finally, I could put everything together and throw it under the broiler to give the potatoes a little bit of a crust. I combined the gravy with the beef and vegetables and put that in the bottom of an oval pan. On top of that was the whole bag of corn followed by the mashed potatoes. I sprinkled some paprika on top of the potatoes and put it all in over for about 5 minutes until golden brown. It looked good once it was done, I just hopped it would taste as good as it looked. Everything mixed together when I scooped it onto our new plates, so it took some time to pick out the flavors from each piece of the dish. Like I said before, the potatoes were great. They were fluffy and had a light cheesy taste. The paprika added a little heat which went well with the heaviness once everything had combined. All of the vegetables gave the dish a lot of color and added a nice crunch to what could have been a mushy dish. The beef had little flavor which I think the gravy was suppose to make up for. The gravy didn’t really add much to the dish so I’ll need to fiddle with the recipe because it was after all, pretty basic.

     This definitely came out better than my previous attempts but I think I may switch out the ground beef for sirloin next time. Hopefully it will be worth the added expense that comes with the sirloin. Christine and Matt both seemed to enjoy it which is all that I could have hoped for. I thank both of them for assisting me; it was fun working with others on the same dish.

Rating: Yummy – Getting closer to a go to dish, needs work on the gravy though.

Chicken Stir Fry 2.0

     Getting home by 6pm at the absolute earliest really puts a strain on what I can make for dinner if I want to be done eating before 7pm. Stir fry is a quick and easy dinner idea that I have made before so a lot of this post will repeat my prior attempt. I made a few changes that I had hoped would be for the better but not all of them ended up not turning out the way I wanted them to. I began as I did before by boiling some jasmine rice and dropped the heat to a simmer while the chicken and vegetables cooked. I only seasoned the chicken with salt and pepper this time and left out the five spice.

     I let the chicken sit a while, while I started on the vegetables. I tried a different mix of frozen stir fry vegetables this time and liked this one better. Asian stir fry is the name of the mix and it contains water chestnuts, baby corn, snap peas, red peppers, and mushrooms. I sautéed the vegetables in a tablespoon of olive oil until they were heated through. Next, I added the chicken in with the vegetables and cooked it until it was no longer pink. I also bought a different sauce to go with the chicken and vegetables since I know Christine doesn’t really care for the traditional stir fry sauce. We agreed upon a Caribbean style sweet and tangy sauce which sounded good. Upon opening the bottle, it seemed a bit watery and not as syrupy as the previous sauce. I added it to the chicken-vegetable mixture and allowed the sauce to reduce to see if I could get a better consistency.

     The sauce never tightened up and I didn’t want to over cook the chicken so I had to go with what I had. Like before I laid some rice on each plate as a base and placed the chicken and vegetables on top. The chicken, vegetables, and rice were all cooked fine but the taste just wasn’t there. Leaving out the five spice took away the ginger flavor that was masked by the stir fry sauce last time. I still think the chicken needs something more but haven’t found what that is yet. The sauce that we went with was kind of bland and not saucy enough for my taste. I guess I’m used to the heavy sauces often found in Chinese cooking.

Rating: Fair – Some changes worked but others didn't.

Chicken Stir Fry

     Not being able to get out of work on time doesn't allow me much time too cook if I want to eat at a reasonable time. This was the story tonight but I had planned ahead by picking out something I knew I could make quickly. I love Chinese food but it is very bad for you so I made this healthier Chinese dish. As soon as I got home I put some jasmine rice in a one and one half cups of water and brought that to a soft boil. While that began to heat up, I cut up a large chicken breast and seasoned it with salt, pepper, and five spice. In a large skillet I began to heat up stir fry oil on a medium heat.
    Once the rice began to boil, I covered it and dropped the heat to low. After about five minutes I added the seasoned chicken to the oil and stirred frequently until cooked through. Wegmans has a variety of frozen vegetable mixes used for stir frying. I went with the Hong Kong mix which contains broccoli, water chestnuts, mushrooms, and snap peas. Add these to the pan with the chicken along with about one third cup stir fry sauce. The Asian section of the grocery store has a pretty good selection of sauces that you can use depending on your taste. I lowered the heat down to keep everything warm while I waited for the rice to be done.
    When the has absorbed all the water, turn the heat off and let rest for about five minutes and then fluff with a fork. I spooned some out to make a base on the plate and then poured some of the stir fry mixture on top. I bought some soy sauce to go on the rice because the sauce doesn't saturate the rice very well.
Rating: Yummy - With so many choices of sauces, meats, and vegetables you can let your imagination run wild.