Roast Chicken with Carrots and Potatoes

I can't believe I haven't posted since NOVEMBER!
I've already seen more than one snowfall.
I've already experienced the creeping of the Freshman 15.
I've already had my fill of pumpkin spice lattes.
I've already given a million Christmas gifts.
I've already gone to Hong Kong and then lost all my pictures (and food reviews) when my computer crashed!
Yes, I've been away for a long, long time. Far too long, if you ask me.
So what warm, welcoming comfort food do you need to fully understand how sorry I am?
Nothing too rich, as I know those resolutions are still going strong. Nothing too hard, because you're probable all cooked out from the holidays. Still, something warm and homey, because January may be over in just a matter of hours, but we've still got a couple of months of cold left--as evidenced by the snow falling outside my window.
How about a roast chicken with carrots and potatoes in the same pan?
Just like a French rotisserie chicken and potatoes, the vegetables are basted with the juices from the chicken and absorb all the savory, tart flavor from the meat and lemon.
This sweet, savory, and tart chicken is a roast ready for a weeknight meal or a holiday feast.

Roast Chicken and Root Veggies       
Serves 6-8

1 4 lb free range chicken
8 cloves of garlic, crushed
2 tbs honey
1 lemon, quartered
1 Tbs coarse sea salt

12 yukon gold potatoes, halved
4 medium carrots, but into 1 1/2 inch pieces
1 Tbs olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste

Preheat your oven to 350º
Clean and dry your chicken and coat with olive oil, rubbing the oil into the skin, then follow with the honey. Stuff the lemon chunks and 8 cloves of garlic into the cavity of the chicken.  Sprinkle the chicken with coarse salt and 1/2 tsp fine ground pepper.

In the bottom of a roasting pan, toss the potatoes and carrots with the olive oil, salt, and pepper. Lay out evenly, leaving a gap in the middle of the pan for the chicken
Put a cooling rack over the potatoes and but the chicken on the rack.
Bake the chicken and potatoes for about 20 minutes per pound (an hour and 30 minutes for a 4 pound bird), covering with foil if the skin begins to get too dark. Stir the potatoes every 20 minutes. After the chicken is cooked for 20 minutes per pound, check that the internal temperature had reached 165ºF. If not, continue cooking until the internal temperature is safe to eat and all juices run clear. Remove the chicken from the oven and allow to sit for abut 15 minutes, until the juices have set inside the meat.
Carefully carve your chicken, serve and...
Enjoy!

Here are some of the recovered HK pictures, as the chicken photos couldn't be saved:

SEE YOU SOON!

Nightcap of Choice: Steamed Cinnamon Almond Milk with Honey and Cardamom--ready with pics

I need to drink something hot after dinner. I call it my nightcap.
If I had my way, it would be hot chocolate every night, but because I have to be rational sometimes, and a day full of cookie baking, followed by a large mug of cocoa cannot be called rational, I usually make tea.
I'm sick of tea right now. I sipped it all summer long, and I want something more. Something that screams fall, something spicy, healthy, and a little sweet.
That's where Andrea comes in.

My sis is a die hard almond milk fan and has really turned me onto the stuff. Her favorite preparation: Steamed.
She usually just gives it a good fluff, maybe with a little bit of cinnamon or honey, but I go hard.
Not like that, oh no, I meant with spices.
Legal, healthy spices.

Steamed Honey-Spiced Almond Milk
Serves 2

1 1/2 cups plain, unsweetened almond milk
2-3 cardamom pods, cracked with seeds inside
3 tsp honey
1/2 tsp cinnamon

Preheat the steam setting on a cappuccino machine.
Fill 2 10 oz mugs (8 oz will cork, but it's a tight squeeze) with 3/4 cup of almond milk, each.
Add half the honey, cinnamon, and cracked cardamom pods to each mug.
Stir well. Using the steamer heat the milk until warm, not adding any foam. Stir again, until the honey is dissolved in the mugs.
Return the mugs to the steamer, moving constantly and bobbing up and down until foamy and hot. Serve hot with the cardamom pods still in the mugs for extra aroma and steeping flavor. Do not eat the pods.

*Make sure you clean your steam nozzle thoroughly, as the honey will make it sticky*

Yeasted Honey Biscotti di Miele

There's nothing better than the smell of baking bread,
Unless it's mixed with the smell of baking cookies.

I made bread on Monday and my family devoured the honey wheat loaf, so I figured it was time to make these biscotti di miele.
They're essentially honey wheat bread in cookie form, made with whole wheat flour, just a ad of honey, and then rolled in coarse raw sugar before baking.
These remind me of something I would have eaten as a little kid after one of my Dad's Saturday Domino's runs. I've always been partial to the hardly sweet Italian cookies, and these are no exception.
They're so old world tasting, it's hard to believe Nonna didn't make them for you.

If you're afraid of yeast, this is a great practice recipe for you because it has a yeast in comparison to flour (pretty much guarantees that it will rise) and the second rise is in the fridge, over night. You can even leave it for up to 24 hours, so there's no need to worry about leaving it for set times, like most bread recipes.

The Perfect Little Cookie to Snack on While Blogging

These biscotti are not overly sweet, beautifully caramelized on the outside, and have a unique texture that you are guaranteed to crave after you make these for the first time.
They're like a soft breadstick, with a a caramel-honey flavor, and a bit of yeast on your tongue after you swallow.

Biscotti di Miele
Makes about 24 cookies, depending on the size of your cutter

1 1/2 cups whole wheat white flour
2.5 tbs cold butter, cut into cubes
2 tsp dry active yeast
1/2 cup warm water (105º)
1/4 cup honey, 1 tsp set aside
pinch of salt
about 1/3 cup turbinado sugar for rolling

In a small bowl of cup, dissolve the yeast in the water with 1 tsp of honey. Let the mixture it for 5 minutes, until foamy. Add the rest of the honey and mix well.
In a medium bowl, mix the flour and salt with a fork. Add the cubed butter and cut into the flour with a fork or pastry cutter, until the mix is crumbly.
Add all of the yeast mixture to the flour and mix until the dough starts to form a ball.
Cover the bowl with a kitchen towel and allow it to sit and rise in a warm place for an hour, or until doubled in size.
After an hour, punch the dough down and transfer to the refrigerator, covered with plastic, to rise over night.
The next morning, roll the dough to about 1/4" thick, on a floured surface. Cut the cookies into circles, then cut the circles into 1/2 circles. You can re-roll the dough 2 times (3 times maximum)
Roll the half circles in turbinado sugar, twist into a stand and pinch the edges together to form a twisted ring.
Lay the cookies on a parchment lined baking sheet. Allow to rise, uncovered for 5 minutes. Preheat your oven to 350ºF.
Twist the cookies one more time before baking for 10-15 minutes, until golden and crisp on the outside.
They should develop a crust that resembles a vey thin bread crust.

Honey Almond Cookies with No Refined Sugar

Sometimes you want  need a cookie. A lot of times, it's too hot, or too fancy an occasion, or you've just already eaten too much to grab for your favorite chocolate chip or peanut butter buddy

(yes, cookies are friends, not food.) 

These cookies bridge the gap between satisfaction and grace perfectly. They're nutty, spongy, and so subtle sweet, they'll make you swoon like a real lady. And, you can have more than one and still feel like gliding, not thumping (or rolling)

Honey Almond Cookies
Makes about 24 cookies

1 1/2 cups almond meal
3/4 cup wildflower (or your favorite type) honey
4 egg whites
1/4 tsp cream of tartar
1/4 tsp powdered ginger (optional)

Preheat your oven to 350ºF, line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper, and move the rack to the bottom of the oven.
In a bowl, mix almond meal, honey, and ginger until well combined
In another very clean glass bowl, whisk egg whites and cream of tartar until the eggs form stiff, shiny peaks, usually about 5 minutes, but it depends on your eggs, bowl and kitchen.
Fold 1/3 of the egg whites into the almond mixture until just combined. Add the rest of the eggs and fold gently. Spoon with a real table spoon (the kind you use for eating) onto the lined baking sheets and pop them in the oven.
After 2 minutes, lower the temperature to 300ºF and continue cooking for 8-12 minutes or until golden and fragrant.
Enjoy!

Healthy Things? and Andrea's Banana Quinoa Muffins

Today is August 1, 2012.
Today, I am beginning a diet.
Today I decided to lose 10 pounds in a month--challenge.
Today I looked up how many calories I have to burn each day to do this--scary.
Yesterday, I went all out at a friend's birthday party because I knew today was Diet Day 1. (A ton of tiramisu tastes good. A ton of tiramisu feels sick)
Yesterday I realized that I could not leave you all stranded without any baked goods for a month.
Today I made healthy muffins that taste fantastic.
Tomorrow I will have one for breakfast.

This whole diet deal is forcing me to create good recipes that are conservative. I love messing around and making rules for myself. I have to say, I've pieced together some good vegan, dairy free, gluten free, nut free concoctions, but for the first healthy recipe, I decided an old stand by would be best. While it's a very rare thing for me to make a carb/fat/calorie-loaded savory dish (I just don't eat that way) I tend to get a little excited when exposed to butter, sugar, and an oven. I've been working with different fats and sweeteners recently, and started replacing most of my flour with whole grain varieties, but fat really does seem to be fat and sugar really does seem to be sugar. Oh, and I can't do carob. I refuse. Don't even talk to me about it.
They're not great for you.
That makes me exceptionally sad.

But, these muffins are not carob. They're the twin's favorite, super easy, protein filled, and adaptable beyond belief. I added sunflower seeds to these ones just because I had a bunch lying around for scones I never really got around to makeing, but you can throw in whatever you want or nothing at all. Plain happens to be my favorite with these.
The nuttiness of the quinoa blends really well with the coconut oil, so you get a nutty bite without actually biting into any chunks, or having to grind almond meal. There's not much more I can say, other than Bananas, quinoa, honey, and coconut is a great combination, and these make a great, filling breakfast that leaves you satisfied, even if you're a habitual lunch-skipper, like me.

If you're feeling reckless, feel free to add an extra 1/4 cup of brown sugar, and use browned butter instead of coconut oil. Because when formerly white foods turn brown, everything is right with the world. Am I right?

Oh, and don't get me wrong, I'm still going to be baking treats for you (every day for the next 20 days, actually) but they're going to be kicked out of the house as quickly as possible. Grandma, coworkers, friends, and anybody else who crosses my path in the next 3 weeks will be presented with food.

Banana Quinoa Muffins
Makes 18 Muffins
Some of my muffins look a little wonky. They're just free form. I had enough batter for 6 more muffins but didn't feel like taking out another muffin tin, so they were just dumped into the liners and arranged on a baking sheet. They cook in the same time and are even more fun to eat.
1/2 cup melted coconut oil
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup raw sugar
2 large eggs
2 large, ripe mashed bananas
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 3/4 cup whole wheat pastry flour (AP works too)
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
1/2 cup dry quinoa
1/2 cup sunflower seeds or your favorite add-ins
1/2 cup unsweetened almond milk mixed with 1/2 cup fat free Greek yogurt
(or 1 cup of buttermilk)

In a medium bowl, combine the eggs, oil and honey until smooth. Add your mashed bananas and vanilla, stirring well.
In a larger bowl, combine the flour, seeds, salt, spices, baking powder and quinoa with a whisk.
Make a well in the center and add your wet ingredients, mix until they are about half way combined.
Add your yogurt-milk and whisk until combined but still slightly. A slightly lumpy batter makes puffier muffins.
Fill your muffin tins about 3/4 of the way full and bake for 20 minutes, or until golden on top and  a toothpick comes out of the center clean.
Enjoy!