Posts Tagged With: basketball

Five Layer Chicken Florentine

Posted on February 5, 2024 by pauldelancey

Italian Entree

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FIVE LAYER CHICKEN FLORENTINE

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INGREDIENTS
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 FIRST  LAYER – BOTTOM SAUCE
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1 10.5-ounce can of cream of celery
½ cup mayonnaise
¾ cup grated sharp cheddar cheese
1 tablespoon lemon juice
⅛ teaspoon salt (⅛ teaspoon more in FOURTH LAYER)
⅛ teaspoon pepper
⅛ teaspoon Mediterranean rice spice
2 tablespoons rice vinegar
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SECOND LAYER – RICE
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1 cup rice
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THIRD LAYER – CHICKEN
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2 chicken breasts
2 tablespoon vegetable oil
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FOURTH LAYER – TOP SAUCE
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1 10-ounce package creamed spinach
½ cup milk
¼ cup grated Swiss cheese
1 small onion
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
⅛ teaspoon thyme
¼ teaspoon coriander
¼ teaspoon Poultry MagicTM spice
⅛ teaspoon salt
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FIFTH LAYER – BREAD CRUMBS AND CHEESE
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½ cup bread crumbs
1 tablespoon butter, melted
¼ cup Parmesan cheese
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SPECIAL EQUIPMENT
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large casserole dish
medium casserole dish
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Serves 6. Takes 1 hour 30 minutes.
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PREPARATION
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The five layers are from bottom to top:
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First: bottom sauce
Second: rice
Third: chicken breast
Fourth: top sauce
Fifth: cheese and bread crumbs
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FIRST LAYER – BOTTOM SAUCE
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Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Add celery soup, mayonnaise, Cheddar cheese, lemon juice, Mediterranean rice spice, ⅛ teaspoon salt, pepper, and rice vinegar to baking dish. Mix thoroughly with fork or whisk. Bake in large casserole dish for 25 minutes at 375 degrees. Set aside. (You can save time by preparing the fourth layer and putting in the oven after you have put this layer in the oven.)
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SECOND LAYER – RICE (Above bottom sauce)
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Cook rice according to instructions on package. Spread evenly over FIRST LAYER in large casserole dish when both are done.
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THIRD LAYER – CHICKEN BREAST (Above rice)
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While at the bottom sauce is baking and the rice is cooking, cut each chicken breast into 12 pieces. Add chicken and vegetable oil to non-stick frying pan. Sauté chicken on high heat for 10 minutes or until it starts to brown. Stir occasionally. Put chicken breasts on top of the SECOND LAYER of rice when all 3 layers are done. (Resist the temptation to drive to KFC.) Set aside,
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FOURTH LAYER – TOP SAUCE (Above chicken breast)
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Dice onion. Add creamed spinach, milk, Swiss cheese, onion, Dijon mustard, thyme, coriander, poultry spice, and ⅛ teaspoon salt to medium casserole dish. Bake for 25 minutes at 375 degrees. Remove and set aside. Put sauce on top of the THIRD LAYER of chicken breast when all 4 layers are done.
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FIFTH LAYER – BREAD CRUMBS AND CHEESE (Above top sauce)
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After you have taken the casserole dishes out of the oven, and have placed the first four layers in order, spread the bread crumbs and Parmesan cheese evenly over the FOURTH layer. Pour the melted butter evenly, as always, over everything. Put the five layers in the large casserole dish back in the oven.
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Bake for 25 minutes at 375 degrees. The sauce layers should be set and the chicken cooked through.
Grab a cold mug of root beer. Sip it slowly. Savor the taste. Grab the frying pan with your other hand. Use the pan to threaten anyone who complains about the wait for this dish. Then eat it all yourself. It’s great.
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TIDBITS
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1) Spinach was cultivated 2,000 years ago in Iran. Now, Iran may very well be contemplating building a nuclear bomb for dubious purposes.
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2) The ancient Romans and Greeks cultivated spinach as well and never built a nuclear device.
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3) So maybe we shouldn’t worry about Iran.
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4) After all Popeye The Sailorman always consumed cans of spinach in times of crisis and always fought for the honor and welfare of his beloved Olive Oyl.
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5) California produces half of America’s spinach.
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6) Did Popeye’s spinach come from California?
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7) Did Popeye ever marry Olive Oyl? I’d like to think so, even if they had to elope to do it.
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8) I had a Yogi The Bear lunch box in first grade. I don’t believe I ever had Five Layer Florentine Chicken put in it.
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9) This recipe originally called for 10.75-ounce can of cream of celery soup. The recipe uses a 10.50-ounce can.
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10) Why?
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11) Shrinkflation. Inflation describes how prices rise over time. Companies know we don’t want to keep paying more for the same thing. So, they shrink the size of their products. They still get the same amount of money from us, but smaller amounts of ingredients, means their products cost them less to produce. They make bigger profits as they think we aren’t clever or observant enough to notice.
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12) Shrinkflation is rampant, especially in times of higher inflation. The size of cans, bottles, jars, and packages in most of my recipes have decreased since press time. Bastids.
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13) It makes me wonder about the opportunities for shrinkflation outside the food industry.
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14) Instead of raising the price of basketballs, make them smaller and smaller. Would this affect basketball games in the NBA? Yes, it would.
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15) Car tires. The price of these tires are already high. Why not make them smaller? And smaller tires will slow your car. You’ll receive fewer speeding tickets. Note, there’s a limit to tire smallness. If the tires become so tiny that they can’t reach the road, the car won’t more. No more shrinkflation. Yay!
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16) Lens size for glasses. Why pay more for a pair of glasses, when you can shrink the lenses? After a while others and you won’t be able to see them. (See what I did there?) No more self consciousness about your appearance.
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17) There should be three more lines of tidbits, but I shrank this section’s size.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, Ph.D.

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: cuisine, history, international | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Pumpkin Shea Butter Soap

Posted on November 2, 2023 by pauldelancey

PUMPKIN SHEA BUTTER SOAP

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INGREDIENTS
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½ pound pumpkin pulp* (no stringy bits)
1 teaspoon orange mica powder
2 teaspoons pumpkin** spice
2 tablespoons isopropyl alcohol
2 pounds shea butter soap base
1 teaspoon cinnamon leaf essential oil
isopropyl alcohol or butter to coat molding
isopropyl alcohol to spray away bubbles forming on soap
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* = Use the pumpkin pulp from your Halloween pumpkin or possibly pick up a free Halloween pumpkin from your supermarket on November 1.
** = Or substitute with 1 teaspoon cinnamon, ¼ teaspoon ground cloves, ½ teaspoon ginger, and ¼ teaspoon nutmeg.
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SPECIAL UTENSILS
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food processor
soap mold
spray bottle
microwave
soap slicer (optional)
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Makes 10½ bars, 1″ wide. Takes 3 hours 30 minutes.
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PREPARATION
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Puree pumpkin pulp in food processor and set aside. Add orange mica powder, pumpkin spice, and 2 tablespoons isopropyl alcohol to small mixing bowl. Mix with fork until well blended.
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Cut shea butter base into 1″ cubes. Add shea butter base to large glass measuring cups. Melt base in microwave with timer set at 30 seconds. Stir after every time. Add orange mica powder/isopropyl mix and cinnamon leaf essential oil. Stir with knife until well blended. Let sit for 6 minutes. (This inhibits pumpkin bits from settling to the bottom of the soap mold.) Add pureed pumpkin. Mix with knife until well blended.
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Spray silicon mold with isopropyl alcohol or rub with butter. Pour into soap mold. If desired, lightly spray bubbles with isopropyl alcohol to make them disappear. Let soap sit for 3 hours. Use soap slicer to cut soap into slices 1″ wide.
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TIDBITS
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1) Spoiler alert, this soap, Pumpkin Shea Butter Soap uses pumpkin.
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2) So does pumpkin pie.
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3) So do many recipes from Africa.
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4) Pumpkins have other uses.
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5) Like jack o’lanterns.
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6) Like pumpkin bowling ball.
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7) Culinary sport historians assert that pumpkin bowling started in the northern states of the Union in 1865.
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8) Because every Northern soldier returning home after the end of the Civil War was given 50 pumpkins when mustered out of the army.
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9) This meant northern towns and cities became inundated with pumpkins.
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10) Pumpkins that would eventually rot. Ugh.
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11) There were only so many pumpkin pies and African entrees featuring pumpkins that people would eat.
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12) So naturally, pumpkin lawn bowling leagues sprang up in any town greater than 6 people.
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13) Didn’t the pumpkin bowling balls break apart when they hit the bowling pins? Yes, they did. But remember, each returning soldier returned with 50 pumpkins.
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14) Pumpkins still remained. Pumpkin Baseball flourished for two weeks in the summer of ‘65.
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15) Frank Butler and Bartolomeo Diaz of Madison, Wisconsin thought up the game of basket ball on June 15th, 1865.
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16) Pumpkin basketball was such fun. The 39 seconds of the first game thrilled the local fans.
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17) But it took only two shots to demolish the pair of pumpkins. Madison would not get anymore pumpkins until harvest time in the fall.
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18) By which time, people plain forgot about Pumpkin Basket Ball, what with the long days devoted to harvesting and eating pumpkin pies.
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19) This is why June 15th is only remembered as a day to pay taxes and not by the National Basketball Association.
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– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, Ph.D.

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: history, soap | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Chicken Basquaise

Posted on November 6, 2022 by pauldelancey

French Entree

CHICKEN BASQUAISE

INGREDIENTS

1 green bell pepper
1 red bell pepper
1 large onion
2 garlic cloves
2 tablespoons fresh thyme
3 tomatoes
2 pounds chicken pieces, bone in or boneless
1 teaspoon salt or fleur de sel*
¼ cup olive oil
3 ounces thinly sliced prosciutto or Bayonne ham*
¾ cup white wine
1 bay leaf
1 cup chicken stock
2 teaspoon Spanish paprika, paprika, or espelette*
1 tablespoon fresh parsley

* = You can find fleur de sel, Bayonne ham, and espelette online, but they can be expensive.

SPECIAL UTENSILS

mandoline
8″ * 12″ casserole dish

Serves 6. Takes 1 hour 15 minutes.

PREPARATION

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Seed bell peppers. Cut bell peppers and onion into ¼” slices with mandoline or knife. Cut slices in half. Dice garlic and thyme. Cut tomatoes into ½” wedges. If you are using chicken breasts, cut them in two. Rub chicken pieces with salt.

Add olive oil and prosciutto to large pan. Sauté for 2 minutes at high heat or until prosciutto becomes crispy. Stir frequently. Remove and drain on paper towels. Add chicken pieces to large pan. Sauté for 10 minutes at medium heat or until chicken turns golden brown. Flip chicken pieces every 2 minutes. Remove chicken and drain on paper towels. Add bell pepper, garlic, and onion. Sauté for 2 minutes at medium-high heat. Stir frequently. Add white wine and bay leaf. Simmer at low heat for 2 minutes. Stir frequently.

Add contents of pan, thyme, chicken stock, and chicken pieces to casserole dish. Sprinkle chicken pieces with Spanish paprika. Place tomato wedges between chicken pieces. Bake for 20 minutes at 425 degrees or until sauces thickens. While chicken bakes, dice parsley. Remove casserole dish from oven. Remove bay leaf. Place crispy prosciutto slice over chicken. Garnish with parsley.

TIDBITS

1) It is well known fact that the Basque word for basket is saskia

2) The Franks who overran Gaul, modern day France, after the fall of the Western Roman Empire loved peaches.

3) Indeed, they invaded purposefully to pick prized perfect peaches produced by the innumerable peaches orchards to be found there.

4) At first, frenetic fresh Franks gathered peaches with their hands.

5) But one can only carry off two peaches that way.

6) The ravenous ravagers ranged right to the Rhone valley. The Rhone Valley had for reasons unclear to current culinary historians had a surplus of over a million peach baskets.

7) An advance party of Franks plundered the valley and carried off all the peach baskets. Indeed, everyone of the frightening Franks walked away with maybe twelve baskets; we don’t know the exact number.

8) The First Franks never went anywhere without their baskets. The enraged basketless Second Franks chased them to southwest France.

9) The locals called them Saskia after the First Franks word for basket.

10) In time the Saskia lost their original language. A new language required a new name. The medieval French dubbed these people, Basques.

11) The Basques loved sports. In particular, they loved to play Basquaise Boule. The object of this game was to pass a ball around and try to toss it into a peach basket. Sometimes the players fashioned the ball out of chicken breasts, hence the name Chicken Basquaise. Chef Jean Paul La Grange created this dish to honor the new sport.

12) But wait! There’s more! In 1890, YMCA director James Naismith toured the land of the Basques. His synapses fired and he determined bring this sport back home. It’d be just the thing to tire out restless school kids. The game proved popular, at first, in his town of Springfield. But the kids eventually grew bored of having to climb up a ladder to retrieve the ball from the peach basket. Late one night, a gang of hoodlums calling themselves The Epic of Gilgamesh Haters cut the bottom off all the baskets.

13) But far from ruining the game, this vandalism, made the game much faster. Indeed the tempo of pass, shoot, score, pass, shoot, score now prevailed. The kids loved the game now. So did their parents. A year later, a senior taking Basque studies opined that as we’re living in America, why not call the name something American like basketball.

14) America embraced basketball and soon became a superpower. Now you know how.

 

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, Ph.D.

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: cuisine, history, international | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Hummus

Posted on February 19, 2021 by pauldelancey

Jordanian Appetizer

HUMMUS

INGREDIENTS

1½ pounds canned chickpeas
½ cup tahini
3 tablespoons olive oil
¼ cup fresh lemon juice
1 garlic clove
¼ teaspoon pepper
1 teaspoon salt

SPECIAL UTENSIL

food processor

Makes 3 cups. Takes 15 minutes.

PREPARATION

Drain water from canned chick peas and reserve. Add all ingredients except reserved water to food processor. Blend until smooth. Add reserved water and blend again until you get a medium-thick paste.

TIDBITS

1) Hummus is an anagram for Mumu HS.

2) Mumu High School is home of the Fighting Mumus.

3) Michael Jordan, the basketball legend, was never a Fighting Mumu. His high school was Laney in North Carolina.

4) Mr. Jordan did not make his school’s varsity basketball team in his sophomore year.

5) I’m sure he could have made varsity basketball his very first year at Mumu High.

6) MJ’s relegation to junior varsity rankled deeply. He channeled his anger into a ferocious desire to be the best. No basketball player has ever possessed a great desired to succeed than he.

7) However, he could have made the lackluster Fighting Mumus without a minute of practice. He would have had no need to tap his astounding drive. Even worse, could he have braved crowds tittering at him and his teams dressed head to toe in mumus? He might have abandoned basketball altogether. Basketball fans everywhere can be grateful for his momentary setback at Laney High.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Speculaas (Dutch cookie)

Posted on March 26, 2015 by pauldelancey

Dutch Dessert

SPECULAAS
(Dutch cookie)

INGREDIENTSSpeculaas-

1¼ cups butter (2½) sticks
1⅓ cups brown sugar
1 medium egg
½ teaspoon baking powder
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground cloves
½ teaspoons ginger
1 teaspoon nutmeg
3 cups flour plus some to dust cookie mold

SPECIAL UTENSILS

speculaas mold, other cookie mold, or cookie cutters
electric beater
sewing thread
1-to-2 cookie sheets
1-to-4 glasses of mulled red wine
wine bottle for bopping oafs

Makes 18 cookies. Takes 15 minutes to make dough, to sit overnight in refrigerator, and maybe 1 hour to make the cookies, plus 15-to-20 minutes each time you put cookie sheets in the oven. You will get better and faster at putting the dough in the speculaas mold, trimming the dough with the sewing thread, and getting the dough out of the mold and onto the cookie sheet in one piece. While getting the hang of things, I say chill out and have some wine to calm yourself down. Note, the upper limit of drinks is for those who use speculaas or other embossed cookie molds. If you just plop down some dough, you only get one glass. There you go.

PREPARATION

Add butter and sugar to first, large mixing bowl. Mix using electric beater set on CREAM until butter/sugar mix becomes creamy. Add egg. Mix with electric beater set on CAKE until well blended. Add baking powder, cinnamon, cloves, ginger, and nutmeg to second, small mixing bowl. Mix together with whisk. Add spice mix from second, small mixing bowl and flour to first, large mixing bowl. Knead mixture until it forms a firm dough ball. Refrigerate dough ball overnight.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Dust speculaas mold for each cookie. Press dough into mold. Gently trim all dough above the line of mold with sewing thread. The top of the dough should be flush with the top of the mold.

Turn mold over and rap it against the cookie sheet. The dough should come out easily and intact if the mold was sufficiently dusted with flour. If not, gently, slowly pull dough out of the mold. If it the shaped dough comes apart in only one or two spots, gently smoosh the pieces together with your fingertip. If someone happens to see this and makes a snarky remark, hit the oaf on its head with the wine bottle. Bake cookies at 350 degrees for 15-to-25 minutes or until cookies turn golden brown.

TIDBITS

1) The first weekend of September is the Redhead Festival in Breda, Netherlands. It started as a local photographer’s quest to find a redhead model. It soon got out of hand. Well, sort of. Redheads walk around seeing other redheads. They even celebrate the color red.

2) It could have so exciting. Why not really celebrate the color red by having tomato fights?

3) Or have ketchup wrestling. That would draw a big crowd.

4) Or have professional drivers race around Breda in red fire trucks instead of race cars.

5) Or let tourists do high diving into a pool of tomato soup.

6) Or hold a contest to build the highest pyramid out of red bell peppers.

7) Or have a contest to eat the most habañero peppers.

8) Or even celebrate ginger. Redheads are often called gingers.

9) Who wouldn’t want to enter a contest to see who could eat the most buttered ginger toast?

10) Go bowling with tomatoes. Professional tomato bowlers recommend a perfectly round. The flattish, not entirely round ones do not go as straight as the perfectly round ones. You’ll never knock down any pins with your tomato if it heads straight for the gutter. Oh, it must be said that the typical tomato has no finger holes as opposed to the standard three-hole bowling ball. This makes tomato bowling even more challenging.

11) Play golf with ginger root! Be careful not to hit your ginger in the woods. It blends in with the leaves. You’ll never find it.

12) Even better, play basketball with tomatoes! Given that tomatoes would make a big splat the first time the ball handler batted the tomato to the ground, fears of players getting away with uncalled double dribbles would be thing of the past.

12) Play football with tomatoes! Since tomatoes are so fragile, soft hands for the quarterback and receivers would be a must.

13) Stage your own bullfights. All you need is a red tablecloth and fast feet.

14) What about ten tons of tomatoes and a bulldozer? Revelers get five minutes on the machine, or fewer if they miss the tomatoes and run into a building.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: cuisine, humor, international | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

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