Sunday dinner: Chicken Pot Pie Crumble

Tonight we went to my future mother-in-law's house to watch The Big Game. So, I made dinner at her house. It didn't go so well first try. I was not used to her oven and burned the crumble and had to start over again. But I got it right the second time and it turned out so good. This is definitely something you should try. You can find the original recipe here.

Ingredients

• 20 oz. boneless skinless chicken breast halves 
• 1 (14.5 oz) can low-sodium chicken broth
• 1 Tbsp olive oil
• 1 cup peeled and diced carrots (I use canned carrots. Me and my canned veges....)
• 3/4 cup diced celery (about 2 large stalks)(I didn't use this because we forgot it at home. haha)
• 3/4 cup finely diced yellow onion (about 1/2 medium onion)
• 2/3 cup frozen peas
• 3 Tbsp butter
• 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup milk
• 1 tsp lemon juice
• 1 1/2 tsp dried parsley
• 1/4 tsp dried thyme (I didn't use this because we thought we had it and didn't. It turned out just fine without it.)

 For the crumble:

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp freshly ground black pepper
• 1/4 tsp garlic powder 
• 1/8 tsp cayenne pepper (optional)
• 1/4 cup butter, cold and diced into small cubes
• 2 oz. finely shredded Parmesan cheese (about 1/2 cup packed)
• 3/4 cup + 2 Tbsp heavy cream

Place chicken in a slow cooker, pour chicken broth over chicken. Cover with lid and cook on low heat about 5 - 6 hours until chicken is cooked through. Remove chicken from slow cooker, dice and set aside. Strain broth from slow cooker through a fine mesh strainer into a bowl and reserve broth (if you don't have a fine mesh strainer just try to remove the pieces of fat). 

To prepare crumble
Preheat oven to 450 degree. In a mixing bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, salt, pepper, garlic powder and optional cayenne pepper. Using your finger tips, cut butter into mixture until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. (I actually used a pastry blender the second time and it worked a lot better than my fingers.) Stir in Parmesan cheese. Pour in heavy cream and mix just until combined. Break and drop mixture into pieces onto a wax paper lined baking pan. Bake in preheated oven for 10 minutes until golden. Remove from oven and set aside. (This is the part where I burned it. If it's not golden on the top but it is on the bottom, it's okay. It'll cook more later.)

To prepare filling
Heat olive oil over medium high heat. Once hot, add diced carrots, onion and celery. Saute vegetables, stirring occasionally until lightly golden and tender, about 5 - 6 minutes. Pour vegetables into a bowl and set aside. Reduce heat to medium, melt butter in saucepan (I like to brown it a bit for and extra layer of flavor), then add in flour and cook, stirring constantly for about 20 seconds (it will be very thick). While stirring, slowly add in milk followed by reserved chicken broth, lemon juice, parsley, thyme and season with salt and pepper to taste. Bring mixture just to a boil, then slightly reduce heat and allow to cook about 1 minute longer until thickened, stirring constantly. Remove sauce from heat and add sauteed vegetables, frozen peas and diced chicken to sauce, then toss to evenly coat. Pour mixture into a 9-inch pie dish and sprinkle with baked crumble topping (mine fit perfectly in my pie dish but if yours is coming close to the top edge you may want to sit it on top of a cookie sheet to prevent spills in your oven). Bake in 400 degree oven until nicely golden about 12 - 14 minutes. Serve warm. Enjoy!!

Let me know if you tried this and what you thought!

A day off and good food

Today was Martin Luther King Jr. day. Many people had either work or school off. I however was expected at school at 8:30 this morning. I planned on getting up at 6:30 and then making the hour drive to school. However, I woke up at 7:30 to a text from my mom. I jumped out of bed and yelled at Josh that we needed to get up right now! I ran around the apartment trying to get ready. Josh, not being used to getting up so early, was moving very slowly, so I checked my email. The first email in my inbox was from my instructor saying that she was sick and class was cancelled. Josh was happy that we wouldn't have to make the drive because the roads were getting bad. I was happy to get an extra day off this week.

Now on to the good food. I made Tator tot casserole for dinner tonight. This is one of my personal favorites. It is very easy to make and it tastes so good. You can make it two different ways. Both ways are delicious.

burger or chicken
1 can of corn
1 can of cream of mushroom soup
tator tots
cheese

If you use burger spread it flat in the bottom of a casserole dish. If you use chicken, cut it into small pieces and lay it out on the bottom of the dish. Both ways the meat should be raw. Spread the cream of mushroom soup over the meat. Drain the water from the corn and spread it over top. Cover the corn in a single layer of tator tots. Set the oven on 350 degrees. Stick it in the oven and leave it for about 45 minutes. When the meat is cooked pull it out and cover it in cheese. Stick it back in the oven until the cheese is melted. Pull it out and Enjoy!

Sunday dinner: Crock pot chicken chili

Since we moved into our own apartment, I decided that, on Sundays, I'll try a new recipe that I found on Pinterest. It will give me a reason to make something new and to try all those yummy looking recipes I see. This Sunday is the first day I'm trying this. I did chicken chili in the crock pot. This is the original recipe. I made some changes as I went along. It turned out a lot spicier than I had expected and I had to add things to make it less spicy. Next time I will just cut things out of the recipe. It was very delicious though and I will definitely be making it again. This is what I did.


1 onion, chopped
1 16 oz can of black beans
1 8 oz can of tomato sauce
1 16 oz can of corn, drained
1 can of rotel (I used the original kind with chile peppers in it. Unless you like things extremely spicy, only use 1 can instead of 2.)
1 packet of taco seasoning
1 tbsp cumin
1 tbsp chili powder
3 chicken breasts (the original recipe says to leave them frozen but I let them thaw just to be safe.)
(I also added a can of diced tomatoes but that was to make it less spicy. If you want more tomatoes I'd suggest adding it.)

Combine onion, beans, sauce, corn, rotel, and seasonings in crock pot.
Place the chicken on top.
Cook on high until chicken is cooked. Pull the chicken apart with a fork and then mix the pulled chicken into the crock pot. Cook on low until done.

I only cooked it for 4 hours and it was done. The recipe said 6 hours on high but I didn't think it needed that long. I think it might have been because my crock pot is small. I'm feeding myself and Josh off of this recipe and we will most likely have left overs. If you try the recipe let me know what you think or if you did anything differently. Enjoy!

P.S. The picture doesn't look very good but it tasted and smelled very good.