Chicken Roasted on Salt

   

I’d like to start this post with a confession: I’m not a big fan of chicken, maybe it’s because I get to eat it pretty often and it’s mostly fried. But this time, I actually was excited about cooking it, and for 2 reasons. First, because I got my hands on this beautiful organic, yellow, plump chicken at around 2,5 kilos. I don’t  say this easily, but this meat was just both gorgeous and delicious. 

The second reason to be excited was the fact that I wanted to cook the chicken on salt, a first in the YOUVEGOTMEAL kitchen. The cooking was a 2 step process, first marinating the meat and the roasting it on salt, on low heat in the oven.

Now, I decided to cut the chicken into pieces, but you can choose to cook it whole, that gives it a more grandiose look (in my case, our tiny oven couldn’t handle a whole chicken). I cut the meat into 5 pieces: 2 whole legs, 2 pieces of breast, each with its own wing attached, and the back of the chicken, that I used to make some stock for later use in the kitchen. For the marinate, use  some olive oil, the juice of 1 lemon, thyme, basil, garlic and pepper. Mix everything together and massage it into the meat, then leave the chicken to rest for 1 hour in the flavored juices. The cooking process is a piece of cake (or salt, if you prefer, that actually sounds easier than making cake). Prepare the baking tray by cutting a big enough piece of baking paper, pop it under some tap water, the just crumble it into your hands then return it to its original shape. This will help you handle it easier when you place it in the tray and it will protect it better from the heat (it will make cleaning the tray a piece of salt- see what I did there?). Next, take 1 kilo of salt and place it in an even layer in the tray and place the pieces of chicken on top, skin side up, and pour the remaining juices on the meat. 

Put the tray in a preheated oven, on medium-low heat and cook the chicken for about 80 minutes. You can check if it’s done by running a knife through the breast, if it goes in easily, remove it from the oven. Leave the meat to rest for 10 minutes before cutting it. I have no idea how the salt work, but the meat was tender, fresh and had a nice crisp on the outside and it didn’t taste like, well, salt. Definitely worth making. As a salad that suited the meat, we just  mixed some lettuce leaves (something called latuga bowl), chopped endives leaves, pomegranate seeds with a dressing made of olive oil, lemon juice, salt, pepper and honey – tangy, crunchy, sweet, perfect.

Enjoy,

Spicy Chicken Wings and Special Fries | You've Got Meal!

The title doesn’t really do justice to this dish as it is a very nice fusion of American, Chinese and Italian cuisine (the Italian part being the beautiful Nero D’Avola that accompanied the meat and potatoes J). This thing is a singe to make and it guaranteed to impress, especially with the spicy food loving crowd.

We used 10 wings that we cut in half, you can adjust the amount of wings according to your own desire. The idea behind cooking the meat here is that we wanted to cook it in a healthier way that just frying it, and we managed to do just that without sacrificing taste. Making these wings is a 2 step process. Start of by flouring the wings (that you’ve thoroughly washed) and placing them on an oven tray that you pop in the oven, at high heat for around 30 minutes. Meanwhile you have time for the second part, another dead easy step. Heat up 75 grams of butter on bain-marie, and this will serve as the base for a sauce that will coat the oven cooked wings. To the butter add 2 (or more, you hot devil J)hot pepper sauce -  I used tabasco, 1 tbs Worchester sauce and 1 tsp of red wine vinegar (I find this step optional, as the hot sauce usually has a fair amount of vinegar in it). Next, choose you condiments. My suggestion is to use ground ones, that mix well in the butter, and don’t overdo it as you can get a dusty feel to the meat. I used  smoked paprika, ground ginger, cardamom, dried garlic powder, curcuma, salt and pepper. Mix the spices with the spicy butter. After the wings are done, remove them from the tray and place them in a large bowl. Pour the sauce on the wings and mix really well, making sure the meat is fully covered with the spicy goodness, and you’re done with the meat. I find this recipe to hold its ground over traditional deep fried wings and you can choose it when you want to avoid an oily situation.

This being a super easy wings recipe, the side dish couldn’t be far away from it. For the Chinese style fries you’ll need to slice your spuds thinly and evenly – think of a No.2 pencil and quarter it- that’t the size you want. Clean the potatoes really well, making sure you get rid of that starch, and let them rest in salted water for 10 minutes. The other things you’ll need are 2 tbs of dark sugar, hot sauce- about 2-3 tbs., and (optional, I’ve explained above why), 1 tbs of rice vinegar, 1 tbs. of soy sauce and some cucumbers, cut the same way as the potatoes. Heat up your wok, add a couple tbs. of peanut oil (or vegetable oil) and add the sugar, hot sauce and vinegar. Immediately pop in the potatoes and mix them well to make sure they are coated with the flavor base. Cook them until almost done. Next add the soy sauce and cucumbers and cook those for another minute or so (you can sprinkle some chopped coriander on top for a more Chinese touch).

I can assure you that this wing and fries mix has nothing to do with its fast food cousins. It may be fast, but make no mistake, it packs a big punch and it is poised to surprise you.  

Enjoy,

Lumaconi alla Parmigiana- Oven-baked Vegetarian Pasta | You've Got Meal!

While we were grocery shopping we stumbled upon a great variety of pasta. Even though we like to make our pasta from scratch, sometimes is nice to come home in the evening and put together some pasta and other simple ingredients for a nice, under 30-minutes dinner.

We got some Pizzocheri pasta, that still wait patiently in the pantry, and a pack of Lumaconi. Lumaconi is a snail shell shaped type of pasta, that is quite thick and long, which makes them perfect for very al dente boiling and oven baking to finish the cooking.

I like my pasta dishes 2 ways, really light and simple or super cheesy, and I always thought that oven baked pasta is super filling. that is why I wanted to go for a meatless choice for Lumaconi. Eggplant or aubergine is a great choice for vegetarians, being high in fiber content it makes you feel full.

The usual layers needed for an oven baked pasta dish are the pasta, some sauce or filling and some other sauce or topping to seal everything. I chose not to fill the pasta to save time, but the flavor was not lost.

I started off by preparing the sauce:

• 4 tbs olive oil
• 4 cloves garlic finely chopped
• small handful of olives, pits removed and cut in round slices
• 1200 ml tomato passata/ pulp (of course you can make your own)
• 1/2 tsp salt
• Heat up the oil, add the garlic, then the olives, stir well.
• Add the tomato paste and let the sauce thicken, stirring from time to time. I let it simmer for about 15 minutes with the lid on because it gets bubbly.

You will also need:

• 1 small eggplant
• 500 g dry Lumaconi pasta
• 500 g mozzarella, cut into cubes
• some basil leaves, depending on how much you like basil
• 100-140 g Parmesan
• some olive oil, to oil the baking tray

• While the sauce simmers, cut the eggplant into slices and then into cubes, deep-fry it until it gets golden, then take it out on an absorbing paper towel.
• Boil the Lumaconi really al dente.
• Grate the Parmesan and prepare the basil leaves.

To arrange the ingredients in a tall baking tray:

• Oil the baking tray bottom and sides with a soaked napkin.
• Pour 3/4 of the sauce on the pasta and mix well, you can  always fill the shells with the sauce. Put aside the remaining sauce.
• Start with a Lumaconi and sauce layer, then add half of the eggplant, half of the mozzarella, some basil leaves and half of the Parmesan.
• Continue with the other Lumaconi layer, eggplant, mozzarella, basil, Parmesan.
• Finish off with the remaining sauce.
• Bake in the oven for 40 minutes, medium heat.

It really is a nice dish, is quite impressive and it is way more easy to make than it seems. We were really satisfied with the result and we hope you try it also. It is great served immediately, but in arder to set a little and have a nice and firm shape like in the first picture, let it acool for a bit.

Enjoy,

Fig and Honey Yogurt- Easy Dessert Recipe | You've Got Meal!

 This post is more about an idea than an actual recipe.

Mixing honey with yogurt is not a real brainstorm here, but you can use that base to build your own version of super easy, healthy and delicious dessert. Why bother to buy some artificial flavored yogurt or other type of sweets when you can make your own? For the version that we made for this post we decided to make the fig the star of the dish. Also, to bring a bit more crunch to the dessert we added some roughly chopped almonds. And to bring a little more zing to the whole dish , we sprinkled some pomegranate seeds on top.

 So, creamy yogurt, honey (use a flavorsome kind- acacia, orange blossom, pine tree, etc.), figs , almonds and pomegranate. Dead easy and incredibly savory. I’m sure you can think of many other combinations that can level this yogurt up, for example you can add a little touch of freshly grated ginger to spice things up or use some chopped fresh coconut as crunch. Go nuts, both literally and figuratively.   

Enjoy,