shrooms brought me here

tonight’s dinner brought me out of retirement. it was that good. the backstory is too long for a facebook post, so here’s some stream of consciousness that you may or may not enjoy.

it all started with yesterday’s lunch. i ended up at the hibachi truck. the vegetable medley included mushrooms. the mushrooms had such a good taste! when i went to the store that evening i got chicken and mushrooms (among other things). when i got home i seasoned the chicken with terriyaki sauce, ground pepper, garlic powder and onion powder. this was after pulling that annoying white bone gristle thing from each strip, which left some of them sort of… not in tact. i decided this would be stir fry chicken and cut them into big chunks. i figured i could cook the chicken the next day and have dinner plus some left over to throw in the salads that i also made (go on with my food prepping self, i know, i know).

when i got home tonight i thought “hmmm, what shall i have for dinner??? i’m not really that hungry after having a heavy lunch, but when has that stopped me before?” so to the fridge i went.

oh look mushrooms! now, what can i make with mushrooms and chicken? i made chicken marsala once (and actually documented it here), but needed something that would work better with the cut up chicken. to google i go! i found some yummy looking recipes. many involved dredging. but dredging involved eggs and flour. for once i had eggs (by the way i’ve conquered eggs and can now eat them when prepared a certain way), but not flour. 🙁

the recipes also called for bread crumbs. thinking i actually had those, i went to the kitchen. here’s what i ended up using in no particular order:

• baby portobello mushrooms, sliced
• zucchini
• celery
• onion
• breadcrumbs (made from 4 pieces of toasted potato bread, one of them that troublesome “heel” – had to toast it, crush it, then toast the crushed parts, crush some more)
• white wine (i used chardonnay)
• chicken broth
• mozzarella cheese- because i can fit cheese into any recipe
• olive oil (just virgin, not the extra prudish virgin because that one burns faster… i think… actually, you might want to google that)

one of the recipes said to transfer the cooked chicken to a warm oven. i had a corningware dish i haven’t used yet. so, i worked that in too.

i used one of my new stainless steel pans. i have yet to conquer this sucker. over the weekend i read a how-to on getting the pan to the right temp so that it doesn’t burn. it involved adding a very small amount of water to the hot oil. i didn’t exactly follow the “small amount” directive. oops. i tested it with way too much water. grease pops ensued. i remembered how i’ve been meaning to get a small fire extinguisher from home depot…

i turned the fire down and all was well.

so here are the steps:

1. marinate and season the chicken way ahead of time in a plastic container.

2. add bread crumbs to the chicken and shake (what ya mama gave ya! sorry, couldn’t resist)

3. wash and cut up the vegetables. i took the stems off of about 4 mushrooms and sliced them. the other veggies were diced, not too big, not too small.

4. open the wine and pour yourself a glass to “test” it

5. turn the fire down if you’ve nearly started a grease fire, like some idiot. pre-heat the oven to about 200 degrees.

6. put the chicken in the pan, carefully. this gave me a chance to use my splatter thingy. had to turn the fire back up a bit, but it was fine once the chicken was in there.

7. let the chicken cook. you can probably do step # 3 now. aren’t you glad you read through all the directions first? i didn’t move the chicken around as much as i would have with regular stir-fry. didn’t want the breading to come off. i needed to add a little more olive oil. flip the pieces just enough. make sure it cooks all the way through. if you press down on them with a spatula they should open up and you’ll see the stringy white meat. cook it a little more after you think it’s done, because that’s what your mother would do and nobody wants to eat raw chicken.

8. transfer the chicken to the brand new corningware dish that you got on sale from target for no real reason other than you have no self-control when you’re in target. if there is some stuff stuck to the pan, leave it. place the dish into the warm oven. maybe cover it. i can’t remember if i did or not.

9. throw the veggies in the pan, add a little more olive oil if it seems too dry. add some pepper and garlic. mix. let them cook for a minute or so until they soften, but don’t let them sear or burn.

10. add chicken broth. some of the other recipes substituted mushroom broth, added cornstarch, blah blah blah… i didn’t have any of that and the chicken broth was going to expire soon. besides, i don’t think i like an overpowering mushroom taste. i didn’t measure, but i added just enough broth to sort of cover the veggies.

11. pour yourself more wine

12. add some wine to the sauce – the same amount you would pour into another glass should be good

13. let it cook. stirring occasionally. maybe 8 minutes? don’t walk away from it… but if you do, come back when a lot of the liquid has evaporated.

14. pour the veggies and sauce over the chicken (that you’ve taken out of the oven, preferably with oven mitts or something else that will act as a barrier between you and the scorching hot brand spanking new, now once used corning dish)

15. add cheese! yes!

16. go to put the cheese away, turn around, walk back to the dish and… add a little more cheese!

16a. put the dish back in the oven

17. go check facebook. tell your friend happy birthday. watch two 4 minute youtube videos. did you pay that bill? pay it.

18. the cheese should be melted by now. remove it from the oven (again, preferably with oven mitts).

19. sprinkle some parsley on top because that’s what one of the googled recipe said to do for “presentation.” and even if you are dining alone, presentation is important… for your instagram photos…

i did take a few pictures of my dish. but it didn’t photograph well. not that it didn’t look delicious, but the pics just didn’t convey its beauty. i’ll have to work on my presentation and staging for online recipe post skills.

so there you have it, my recipe for chicken and mushroom something or other. it was really really good. i drank more wine with it. i feel kind of bad for you because you didn’t get to have any and i doubt i’ll be able to replicate the dish exactly if you ever come over for dinner. but don’t worry, i probably won’t invite you over for dinner so you won’t experience that disappointment. and hopefully you’ll be able to create your own chicken and mushroom something or other dinner with a few basic ingredients and whatever you have on hand. i think that’s what makes cooking fun – that “oh well, i guess this will have to work” experimentation.