Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 cloves garlic, crushed and finely chopped
• 1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes, or to taste
• 6 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
• 2 cups prepared marinara sauce
• 1/4 cup chopped fresh basil
• 1 (8 ounce) package shredded mozzarella cheese, divided
• 1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese, divided
• 1 (5 ounce) package garlic croutons

Method

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
2. Coat the bottom of a 9x13 inch casserole dish with olive oil, and sprinkle with garlic and hot red pepper flakes.
3. Arrange the chicken breasts in bottom of the dish, and pour marinara sauce over chicken. Sprinkle basil over marinara sauce, and top with half the mozzarella cheese, followed by half the Parmesan cheese. Sprinkle on the croutons, then top with the remaining mozzarella cheese and remaining Parmesan cheese.
4. Bake in preheated oven until cheese and croutons are golden brown and the chicken is no longer pink inside, about 35 minutes to an hour, depending on the shape and thickness of your chicken breasts. An instant-read thermometer inserted into the thickest part of a chicken breast should read at least 160 degrees F (70 degrees C).

2015-12-31: I used a smaller baking dish and chicken thighs instead of breasts. Skipped the croutons since I'm avoiding carbs. I used traditional Prego for the sauce.

Turned out pretty good. Reheated well. Before I make it again, though, I should double check the carb count on the sauce.

I made this first in Russia. It turned out great. Today I made it in the US, and it sucked. I used «Food Club Real Mayonaisse» from Fry's Groceries. Way too salty. I need to either find a different mayonnaise or make the mayonnaise myself. Weirdly enough, Russian stores have a much better selection of mayonnaise than typical US stores do.

• 200 grams (7 oz) of hard cheese
• 1-2 hard-boiled eggs
• 1-2 cloves of garlic
• mayonnaise

Attempt 3

2015-11-21: I made it again, this time with pre-grated cheddar, which makes the salad look quite different since in Russia one uses white cheese. This time I used 1/2 cup of mayo. I'm thinking next time 3/4 cup would be better. And instead of garlic cloves, I used 1 tsp of garlic powder.

• 7 oz of shredded cheddar cheese
• 2 medium-size hard-boiled eggs
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• 1/2 cup of mayonnaise

Damn, this is simple.

• Vegetable oil
• 2 cups of buckwheat
• 4 cups of boiling water
• 1 cube of chicken bouillon

Pour vegetable oil in pan. Turn on low heat. Pour in buckwheat. Turn on your hot water pot to boil. In the meantime with a spatula mix the buckwheat so that all the grains are covered with a bit of oil. You could toast it a bit if you wanted. Pour the boiling water over it when ready. Drop in the cube. Put a lid on it. Cook till the water is gone. Don't stir.

I suspect you could skip the oil step.

Turned out fine. In the past I've had buckwheat with a much stronger taste, but this time it was pretty mild. I wonder why?

Variations:

• I think this would be accompaniment to strong-tasting main dishes.
• It would also be good with some brown gravy and a poached egg or two on top.
• It would also be good to reheat the cold buckwheat in butter, but it aside, and serve up a couple fried eggs with it.

2014-07-12: I've tried a couple more variations.

• Mix the buckwheat with some hot mustard, throw it in the microwave. Good.
• Mix the buckwheat with some soy sauce, throw it in the microwave. Good.

I decided to try this recipe myself in an attempt to duplicate Diane's lovely dinner.

1. Sauteed a thinly sliced onion in olive oil. Removed the onions to a bowl once sweet.
2. I started with three skinless half-breasts of chicken. To reduce cooking time, I cut the thick parts away from the thin parts, and then sliced the thick parts longwise in half. Then I browned them (not very brown) on both sides in the olive oil from the previous step. Removed the chicken from the pan.
3. Returned the onions to the oil. Poured a glass of red wine into the pan. Brought to a gentle boil. Added the chicken back to the pan. Poached about ten minutes on one side. Sprinkled lightly with table salt, black pepper and garlic powder.
4. Turned the chicken to the other side. Sprinkled lightly with table salt, black pepper and garlic powder. Added more wine as needed to continue poaching.
5. Removed the breasts after 10 minutes.
6. Served the chicken with onions and sauce over it.

It came out edible. This time the preparation was more interesting than the actual result. Thoughts for next time:

• For wine I used a Fetzer Merlot. My theory was that chicken has a gentle flavor, and I didn't want to overwhelm it with too spicy a red, whereas in fact generally I favor very peppery cabernets. Frankly, it was a bit dull. Next time I'll try the peppery cab.
• Next time I'll brown significantly longer, hoping for a bit more umami, carmelly meat taste, and I'll poach longer to soften the meat more, probably fifteen minutes per side.
• Next time I'll put more time into the sauce after the chicken has been removed, maybe adding some vinegar and lemon, perhaps guided by this recipe. Then perhaps I'll run it through the blender before serving.
• I like the idea of a bay leaf in the poaching sauce.

The other day a new acquaintance, Diane, prepared chicken poached in red wine for me and my friend Scot. It's a standard go-to dish in Spain where good, inexpensive red wine is commonly available. Here is what she did.

1. Sauteed a thinly sliced onion in olive oil. Removed the onions to a bowl once sweet.
2. Removed the tendons from three skinless half-breasts of chicken. Browned them (bare hint of brown) on both sides in the olive oil from the previous step. Removed the chicken from the pan.
3. Returned the onions to the oil. Poured a glass of red wine into the pan. Brought to a gentle boil. Added the chicken back to the pan. Poached about ten minutes on one side.
4. Turned the chicken to the other side. Sprinkled with lemon salt. Added more wine as needed to continue poaching.
5. Removed the breasts after 10 minutes

Comments:

• She removed the tendons because the tendons tend to shrink up and distort the shape of the chicken breast as they brown.
• When she browned the chicken, she didn't try to cook the breasts all the way through. They were just barely browned.
• She commented that the poaching took too long because the breasts were too thick. She said the should have pounded them first.

The dish makes an impression for several reasons. First off, the simplicity is striking. Secondly, the purple color of the final product. She served it with asparagus steamed plain on the side, which was a lovely contrast.

I've never done such a thing, so this recipe is high on my list of things to try.

Ingredients

Butter for the casserole dish
1 onion, diced
10 oz frozen chopped spinach
8 eggs
1 lb of chorizo (uncooked)
2 cups of cheese, shredded

Method

Fry the chorizo and onions together till done. It's hard to tell visually when chorizo is done, but fry it for about ten minutes. Chop and drain the thawed spinach. Preheat oven to 300°F. Butter the casserole dish. Mix chorizo, onions, spinach together. Let cool till you can mix them with eggs and cheese without the eggs immediately cooking. Beat ingredients together. Put in buttered 8x8 casserole. Cook 55 minutes without opening the oven, remove, let sit 15 minutes.

Very tasty. This can now be a standard recipe, I think.

2014-04-30: here is my fourth variation. This time I used beef chorizo, skipped the onion, used eight eggs. Initial cooking time 55 minuytes without interruption, then let it sit 15 minutes. Turned out great. I have now concluded these 8-egg recipes are good at 55 minutes, whereas the 5 egg recipes are good at 40 minutes. I also concluded that if you have bought frozen spinach, you really don't need to boil it before putting it in the mix. Just be sure it is at room temperature and squeeze excess water out, then chop it up fine.

Reheating of one slice (1/4 of the quiche) in my microwave works well over 4 minutes at power level 4.

Ingredients

1 lg head of cauliflower, chopped/shredded
1 1/2 cups of salted peanuts (red, skinned, Spanish)
7 oz dried cranberries
2/3 cup mayonnaise
1/3 cup sugar

Method

Place cauliflower, peanuts & cranberries in bowl. Mix mayo & sugar together. Stir into salad. Mix thoroughly. Cover and refrigerate at least 1 hour. Makes 10 cups.

Thanks to Katie for the recipe. I had the salad at a picnic on Sept 1, 2013. She thinks she got the recipe decades ago from a Sunset magazine.

I decided I wanted steak for breakfast. Grabbed a 1 lb top sirloin at Fry's for $8. Turned on the broiler in the oven. Broiler doesn't work. Damn. I'll have to stove-top it. Pulled out the dutch oven, put it on the back burner so the smoke would most effectively be removed by the fan, turned the stove to 7, which is way hotter than I normally cook.

I covered the steak with a bit of olive oil, some garlic powder and ground red pepper. Cut it in two so I could cook just half at a time. Gave it maybe three minutes a side so it was still red and bloody inside. So good! Next time I'll be a touch more generous with the garlic and red pepper.

May 19, 2003, second time around. This time around I tried the temperature higher, at 7.5. This does not work as well. The surface burns too fast and the center doesn't get cooked. The level 7 worked okay for a pretty rare steak, but if I want the cooking to get more toward the center, I'm probably going to have to do a 5 or 6, especially if I'm cooking for someone who likes his steaks well done.

October 14, 2013, another round. I may have waited too long to record this, but here is my memory. I took 1 tbsp of red pepper (spicy, not wimpy), 1 tbsp of garlic powder (cheap generic) and 1 tbsp of sea salt. Mixed them together, rubbed them on both sides of the steak. Fried them on the stove top at temperature 5 until it seemed right. Freakin’ awesome.

Power 5 is confirmed for good steaks on my current stove.

Essentially I tried this dish. Bleah. Never again.

Ingredients

1 (16 ounce) package egg noodles
1 pound lean ground beef
1 (.75 ounce) packet dry brown gravy mix
1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese
1 (6 ounce) can chopped mushrooms, with liquid
1/2 cup milk
1 (8 ounce) container sour cream
2 (10.75 ounce) cans condensed cream of mushroom soup

Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Add egg noodles and cook for 8 to 10 minutes or until al dente; drain.
In a skillet over medium heat, brown the ground beef until no pink shows; drain.
Mix brown gravy, cream cheese and mushrooms with hamburger until cream cheese has given the mixture a whitish look. Add milk, sour cream, and mushroom soup to cooked pasta. Blend hamburger mixture with pasta.

Ingredients

• one quarter head of cabbage, shredded fine
• juice of two small lemons
• salsa brava

Method

Mix cabbage with lemon juice till all the cabbage is covered. Mix with enough salsa brava to cover all the cabbage. Makes two servings.

I liked this.