Who's Chicken?

Here are three chicken recipes that I've totally stolen from cookbooks. But they're so good I had to share!

Flamin' Poultry (serves 2)
Ingredients:
- 2 teastpoons butter
- 1/4 cup hot sauce
- 2 boneless, skinless chicken breast, halves, cut into bite size pieces

1) Melt the butter in a skillet over medium heat. Add the hot sauce and mix.
2) Add chicken, stir to coat, and cover. Cook for about 10 minutes or until chicken is cooked through.

Crispy Cracker Chicken (serves 2)
Ingredients
- 1 egg white
-1/2 cup crushed crackers or chips (Wheat Thins, Triscuts, Tortilla chips, etc)
-1/2 grated Parmesan cheese
-2 boneless, skinless chicken breast halves
- I like to add chilli powder, dried basil, or whatever

1) Preheat the oven to 350 degress F
2) Beat the egg white well. In a separate dish, mix the crushed crackers and Parmesan.
3) Rinse and pat dry the chicken breasts. Coat first with the egg white, then the cracker mixture
4) Plce the chicken in a pan and bake for about 35 min., until the chicken is cooked through and the cracker coating is crispy.

Finally, Chicken Delight (serves 2)
Ingredients
- 2 Chicken breasts (or turkey)
- Handful of basil leaves
- 8 cherry tomatoes
- 1/2 cup of miso or bouillon

1) Lay a sheet of foil on a baking tray and place the chicken breasts on the foil.
2) Tear the basil leaves, halve the tomatoes, and toss over the chicken
3) Using a teaspoon of bouillon or miso, mix a half cup of boiling water to make a stock and then pour over the chicken.
4) Fold over the foil to make a parcel and bake in the oven on 400 degrees F for 20 mins.

I love all these. They're hella simple and make great leftovers.

San Fransisco- The Ferry Building

Possibly the greatest food day ever was the Ferry Building. It's a building, by a ferry, that's just food. Lot's of it. And different kinds. We went on a Farmers Market Day and had some of the best peaches, nectarines, and strawberries ever! Then we went inside for some shopping! Here's the rundown:

- While standing around the farmers market we spied Elizabeth Faulkner (from Top Chef Masters). We then proceeded to spend about 20 mins deciding whether or not we should ask for her picture. By the time we manned up, she had left.

- We stopped by Boccalone, a sausage place owned by Chris Cosentino (Food Network celeb chef). Is it sad that my mom and I get crazy excited by Food Network Stars?

- We stopped at a mushroom place and got a piece of Dark Chocolate w/ Black Truffle Oil. Fancy; it was $4 for an oz of chocolate.

- For lunch we got a Delica bento box with rice, hijiki salad (a form of seaweed), a traditional seaweed salad, and fantastic pork katsu (breaded and fried pork). Tasted like Japan.

- We got Chai High Honey. Basically it's a honey that will flavor black tea to taste like Chai Tea. Yum!!!

- We tried cheese at Cowgirl Creamery (a renowned SF cheese place). I got fresh chevre (my fave!!) and my mom got a Humbolt, a cow's cheese available only on the coast of Cali.

- After all this we got a coffee from Blue Bottle Coffee. It's a special Japanese-style drip coffee that is the strongest stuff I've ever tasted! I've had lots of coffee (that's a different post) but this stuff kicked my butt! I couldn't even finish it.

-Finally we got the best raw oysters from Hog Island Oysters. I love raw oysters! And this is a pic.



We got the 6 different oysters. My fave is the one with peppers in it. I believe it's from Virginia.

Hungry yet?

San Fransisco- Asian Food

Sorry I haven't posted in a while! My computer was in for repairs. So here's a continuation of my mother's and my SF Adventures! Of course, we had the prerequisite of sushi, and steamed pork buns (aka bao).

My mom and I went to a restaurant called Morph. It's Asian Fusion, which I'm usually not a fan of. But these dishes were as delish as they were gorgeous.



This was a Tuna Salad. It's got two kinds of seared tuna, and onions and sprouts that have been covered in a lemon-ginger dressing.



This was my entree. Small, yes, but filling. It's miso-marinated Alaskan cod with sauted asparagus,carrots, and cherry tomatoes. Awesome!!

I would have taken a pic of my desert (Thai pancakes with strawberries and a green tea sauce) but I ate it too fast!!



Next to Chinatown! This is what's called Dim Sum. It's like Chinese tapas, Or Epicurean Russian Roulette. My mom and I looooove a good Dim Sum, but we're never quite sure what they're giving us. What happens is that kind Chinese people wheel around carts of food and ask you if you want whatever they're serving. Usually it's impossible to decipher exactly what the dish is. So you get it and hope it's not chicken feet. My mom and I are fortunate enough to understand what we want, as we've eaten so much Dim Sum. On these plates were: sesame seed balls, some sort of rice/chicken concoction, duck, Chinese-style shumai with shrimp, and tea. Yum!!!

San Fransisco- North Beach

My mom and I had a nice little holiday in San Fransisco last week. It was a foodie extravaganza! Our first day was a foodie tour of North Beach, the Italy side of town.



This was Caffe Roma, and it's the first place I've had a cappuccino that taste like an Italian Cappuccino.




Next stop: XOX Truffles! This guy makes the best truffles in the city and has won a variety of awards. He makes tiny 60% dark chocolate balls of ganache and loads it with yummies like rum orange, or chipolte tequila. Or he rolls them in coffee or coconuts. Seriously, the best truffles I've ever had.




Third: the North Beach Bakery. They make delicious fresh bread. We did a tour of the back and it smelled soooo good! Just three guidos making bread.



This is apparently where the first two Godfather films were written. It's also famous for random street musicians playing music. I walked in and these guys had the thick Italian-American accents!



And finally, a pizza place, of course. Now, I don't really like pizza. I've had pizza in NY, Chicago, and Italy. And it's just not my fave. To be honest, as good as this pizza was, I'm still not a huge fan. But the white pizza with potatoes was delish. And the Margherita pizza is just like Firenze!

So this was North Beach! It was Italian (therefore loud!) and delicious!!

A Few More Smoothies

So I've decided that bananas are the magic ingredient in a smoothie. I've been without this magical fruit for about 2 weeks, and suddenly there they were, sitting on the counter like a present! So I used them. Bananas add a nice texture, a thickness and a sweet flavor, without having to add sugar. This is what I came up with:

Blood Orange-Banana
- 1 blood orange (whole)
- Juice of 1 blood orange (there's a juicer here and I use it!)
- 1 banana
- spinach (but I really wish I had celery. Orange and celery is my new favorite combo)

Blend together. Using fresh juice made the whole thing a little frothy and this is very very acidic! Beware!

Pineapple-Banana
- Pineapple chunks
- 1 Banana
-chopped spinach (again, I'd like to add celery)

Blend together. This one is a little thicker I added spirulina to both of these. Yummy!!!

Farmers Market Time!

I love fresh fruit. I love farmer's markets. Therefore, I love the Central Coast because they have great fruit stands everywhere and Farmer's Markets every day. Because of my work schedule I could only go the San Luis Obispo (SLO) Farmer's Market (all the other one's are too far away or are during the day while I'm at work). But in light of my adventure , I figured I'd talking about the great produce out here.

My favorite adventure-Blueberry picking! There's U-Pick blueberry farm between Buellton and Santa Barbara. If you've never done one of these, it's pretty fun. I picked strawberries years ago (I think in San Diego).

So I went with a friend in tow, and together we picked a fair amount of blueberries. What happens is they give you a 32oz bucket and you fill it as much as you want. If you fill the whole thing it's $15. If you fill it 1/3 to 1/2 (like I did) it's about $4. K, so I got a good 12 oz of fresh blueberries for $4.00!!!! Love it!!!
And yes, I ate a good 2 cups worth while picking. I knew this place would be my lunch. But you know what, it doesn't matter. It's not stealing cos they will go bad if I don't munch on a few of them.

Orcutt Farmer's Market- It's really small, just a few stands and it's not nearly as fantastic as the one in SLO. But I what I really wanted to mention was the amazing Sweet Wine Jam I bought. There was a woman there selling various jams. Most of them had chipolte in it (I'm not in to that). There was also Jalapeno Jelly and Mint Jelly. But the Sweet Wine caught my eye. There is legit Cabernet in it (yeah I read the ingredients). So I had to give this place an honorable mention.

San Luis Obispo Farmer's Market- Everyone on the Central Coast knows that SLO's Farmer's Market is the best around. Thursday night that is the place to be! There's food, music, sales, and what-not.

First off, the produce. So goood and so cheap!! Avocados for 50 cents a pop, 2.50 for the best peaches ever (Cal Poly), $2 for local strawberries that are actually ripe

(NB: the way to know if a strawberry is fresh is when you bite into it, it's red. Check next time you go to Walmart and buy strawberries. Bite into those and it's all white. Also, ! It certainly pays to eat local in California. Also, the package should smell of strawberries! That means they're good! yes, they won't last as long as store-bought, but it may not matter if they're good.)

Second, the prepared food. There's some bad food (I had a not-so-good taco salad once). But there's a BBQ line that lasts forever! (I think it's McClintocks) There's also an amazing dip stand that has great amazing dips: spinach dip, pesto, artichoke dip, garlic cream cheese. I love this place!! And there's also a fab Meditterean place with awesome hummus, great baba ganoush, and blocks of feta cheese. I die!!!
My favorite find here is the Nectarine Jam from Mt. Olive. It was (cos I ate it all) delicious, perfectly sweet w/o feeling sugary. and decently priced too.
And they sell amazing cherries here, which are now out of seasons, but I just had to say it!!!

You know you're hungry now!