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Third time's the charm: Thai chicken soup
Week one of the Crock Pot: beef curry stew. This was all right, it didn't quite... blend, I think. Something seemed missing about the flavor. Maybe I needed cumin?
Week two of the Crock Pot: beef chili. Again, it didn't quite gel. I used largely the same ingredients as the other time I'd made beef chili, but it felt like it needed, maybe, cheese to give it smoothness.
But this week, I decided to try making Thai chicken soup. And it came out perfect!
Of course I didn't follow the recipe quite so exactly. For one thing, I skipped the mushrooms. Ew, fungi that goes *squit* between the teeth, not at all like meat.
The majority of the ingredients were the same, but I sautee'd the onions, then the carrots, that I put in, with lemongrass in squeezable form (just try finding real lemongrass at Safeway's), chopped ginger (from a jar), garlic powder in place of minced garlic (you think I have time to spend mincing garlic?) and crushed red pepper, in order to "activate" the aromatics. Then I browned the chicken thighs to sear the skin, and put those in to simmer for six hours.
Well, actually, since I also had a head of bokchoy that I needed to get rid of, I chopped that up and added it in as well. Dissolved right into the soup, making it (theoretically) healthier and tastier, though in practice I couldn't tell there was bokchoy in the soup. Maybe I should try adding it later in the cooking?
In retrospect, I'd just remove the chicken skin in the future, or cook the chicken skin separately and keep it out of the soup if I wanted "cracklin's". But, the chicken became deliciously fall-off-the-bone tender after all that slow-cookin'. I used tongs to fish them out, extracted the bones, shredded them, and mixed them back in along with a can of "lite" coconut milk, Thai red curry paste (yellow proving unavailable at Safeway's), and a palmful of cilantro, then mixed it up and let it sit in "keep warm" for ten more minutes.
It came out pretty spicy - but also delicious! Definitely a keeper of a recipe for me, though I'm not sure that it's substantial enough to be a meal all by itself. Eat with French bread, though, and that should temper the spice nicely.
Week two of the Crock Pot: beef chili. Again, it didn't quite gel. I used largely the same ingredients as the other time I'd made beef chili, but it felt like it needed, maybe, cheese to give it smoothness.
But this week, I decided to try making Thai chicken soup. And it came out perfect!
Of course I didn't follow the recipe quite so exactly. For one thing, I skipped the mushrooms. Ew, fungi that goes *squit* between the teeth, not at all like meat.
The majority of the ingredients were the same, but I sautee'd the onions, then the carrots, that I put in, with lemongrass in squeezable form (just try finding real lemongrass at Safeway's), chopped ginger (from a jar), garlic powder in place of minced garlic (you think I have time to spend mincing garlic?) and crushed red pepper, in order to "activate" the aromatics. Then I browned the chicken thighs to sear the skin, and put those in to simmer for six hours.
Well, actually, since I also had a head of bokchoy that I needed to get rid of, I chopped that up and added it in as well. Dissolved right into the soup, making it (theoretically) healthier and tastier, though in practice I couldn't tell there was bokchoy in the soup. Maybe I should try adding it later in the cooking?
In retrospect, I'd just remove the chicken skin in the future, or cook the chicken skin separately and keep it out of the soup if I wanted "cracklin's". But, the chicken became deliciously fall-off-the-bone tender after all that slow-cookin'. I used tongs to fish them out, extracted the bones, shredded them, and mixed them back in along with a can of "lite" coconut milk, Thai red curry paste (yellow proving unavailable at Safeway's), and a palmful of cilantro, then mixed it up and let it sit in "keep warm" for ten more minutes.
It came out pretty spicy - but also delicious! Definitely a keeper of a recipe for me, though I'm not sure that it's substantial enough to be a meal all by itself. Eat with French bread, though, and that should temper the spice nicely.
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I have a lot of garlic powder so I figured there's little difference. };)
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I have been in a real cooking rut lately - trying to break out of it (though last night's experiment was a bust), thanks for the inspiration!
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The most complicated thing I've made recently was pancakes. I still plan to try some of your stew recipes some day, though! =^.^=
-Deuce
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