Chicken Parmesan Burgers

Last night I made Chicken Parmesan Burgers. They were very tasty, but could be improved upon. They weren't quite as crispy as I would like on the outside - maybe rolling the patties in bread crumbs would help. Here's the recipe. Enjoy!

Chicken Parmesan Burgers
Ingredients:
1 LB Ground Chicken
1/2 Cup Parmesan Cheese
1/2 Cup Bread Crumbs
2 Tbsp Minced Fresh Basil
1 Tbsp Minced Garlic
1 Tbsp Italian Seasoning
Salt and Pepper to taste

1 Cup cheese (we used colby jack, but you're supposed to use Mozzarella)
1 Cup Marinara sauce
4 Hamburger Buns

Directions:
1. Preheat Broiler to 500º F
2. Place the ground chicken, Parmesan cheese, bread crumbs, basil, garlic, Italian seasoning, salt and pepper in a bowl and combine. The easiest way I found to do this was with my hands.
3. Once all of the patty ingredients are combined, form 4 patties with your hands.
4. Place patties on a broiler pan and bake on each side for 6-10 minutes.
5. Spoon some marinara sauce on each patty and top with cheese. Bake for an additional minute.
6. Serve on toasted hamburger buns with lettuce and tomato.

Southwestern Shrimp Soft Tacos

The other night, I made some Southwestern Shrimp Soft Tacos with guacamole and home made tortilla chips. The tacos turned out great. The marinade tasted a lot like the "Mojo" cooking style at The Melting Pot, which was very unexpected. I made my usual guacamole recipe, which is included below, as well as some tortilla chips. I had never made tortilla chips before, so I thought you could make them with whole wheat tortillas (I'm trying to eat somewhat healthy). I was completely wrong! They cooked properly, but tasted terrible. I had to throw the whole batch away and have Melody pick up some corn tortillas on her way home. Now to the recipes!

The Guacamole
Ingredients:
2 Large Avocados (or 1 "slimcado")
1 Roma Tomato, diced
2 Tbsp White Onion, Minced
1 Tbsp Jalapeno, Minced
Juice from one Lime
A dash of salt

Directions:
1. Cute the avocados in half and remove the seed. Use a spoon to pull out all of the meat and place in a medium bowl. Use a fork to soften the avocado and mash it together.
2. Prepare and place all of the other ingredients into the bowl and mix thoroughly.
3. Serve with Chips (The 365 Brand Pita Chips from Whole Foods are great with this!)


Home Made Tortilla Chips
Ingredients:
At least 8 Small corn tortillas (each one makes about 6 regular sized chips)
PAM Cooking Spray
Salt (Sea Salt is great with these)

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 425º
2. Place the tortillas on a couple of baking sheets.
3. Spray tortillas with PAM and sprinkle with salt
4. Bake 6-8 minutes, or until slightly browned.
5. Let cool for at least 10 minutes until they get crispy


Southwestern Shrimp Soft Tacos
Marinade Ingredients:
11⁄2 tbsp minced red onion
1⁄2 tsp finely chopped garlic
1 tbsp honey
1 tsp chopped fresh cilantro
1⁄2 cup freshly squeezed lime juice
1⁄2 tsp Jamaican jerk or Cajun seasoning
1⁄2 tsp paprika
16 white shrimp, shelled, deveined, tails removed

Marinade Directions:
Combine marinade ingredients with 1⁄4 cup water and season with salt. Add shrimp; refrigerate 1 hour.

Corn Relish Ingredients:
2 ears corn (or 1 cup canned or frozen and thawed)
Vegetable-oil cooking spray
6 Roma tomatoes, diced
1 green onion, chopped
Lime or lemon-pepper seasoning

Corn Relish Directions
1. Cut corn kernels off cob.
2. Lightly spray a sturdy skillet with cooking spray and heat over moderately high heat.
3. Stir-fry corn until golden brown.
4. Pour corn into a bowl and add remaining relish ingredients; season with salt.

Cooking the Shrimp and Marinade:
1. Remove shrimp and reserve marinade.
2. Lightly spray the same skillet with cooking spray and heat on high until very hot. Toss in a few shrimp at a time and cook until just opaque; remove shrimp.
3. Pour marinade into pan, bring to boil and boil for 2 minutes; lower heat and simmer until thick.
4. Put 4 shrimp on each tortilla; top with corn relish and marinade sauce.


We loved this meal! Cant you tell?

Rattlesnake Pasta and Lemon Champaigne Mousse

First of all, let me start my first blog off by saying that I'm not the best cook, but I can follow directions. I will be going through recipes that I want to learn and will tell you how each of them turn out and any changes I would make. I will also tell you about great food that I find in my travels.

Friday night, we had our friends Ericka and Adam over for dinner. We had a nice evening with dinner and some board games. Usually when I have guests for dinner, I like to try a new dish. This time, I tried two new dishes. The main course was very similar to J. Alexander's Rattlesnake Pasta. The dessert was a Lemon Champagne Mousse. So, I'm going to give you the recipes first, then tell you how each turned out.


The Pasta

Ingredients:
8 tablespoons butter
1 cup heavy cream
12 tablespoons Parmesan cheese
2 tablespoons flour
Salt and pepper to taste
1/2 Cup each of Red, Green, Yellow, and Orange Peppers
3 tablespoons minced garlic in olive oil
1 lb. roasted chicken chunks
Spaghetti

Directions:

Combine butter, cream, Parmesan cheese, flour and salt and pepper and heat very slowly till thickened. Add the peppers, garlic and roasted chicken and heat through. Serve over spaghetti.

The pasta turned out great! The original recipe called for 1 cup of Jalapenos, and no red, green, orange or yellow peppers. It also called for 10oz of chicken, which is about what I made, but it could definitely use more. It's best if you cut the chicken before you cook it. I also serverd some garlic bread along with it - just the Publix brand which is very tasty!



Lemon Champagne Mousse

LEMON CURD
Ingredients:
5 lemons
5 limes
2 cups sugar
8 large egg yolks
2 whole eggs
1 ¾ sticks unsalted butter, cut into pieces

Instructions:
1. Place 1/2 cup lemon and 1/2lime juice, sugar egg yolks, whole eggs, and butter in a saucepan. Whisk until combined. Cook over medium heat, whisking constantly until it begins to boil (approx. 7 mins.).
2. Push curd through a chinois or strainer. Refrigerate for an hour or overnight.

CHAMPAGNE MOUSSE
Ingredients:
1 ¾ cups heavy whipping cream
3 tablespoon of champagne

Instructions:
1. Whip chilled heavy cream until it doubles in size and forms soft peaks.
2. Reserve ½ cup of lemon curd for sauce.
3. Add the champagne to the remaining curd and mix until incorporated.
4. Fold champagne and curd mixture into whipped cream.

CANDIED LEMONS
Ingredients:
3-4 lemons
3-4 limes
½ c lemon juice
½ c lime juice
2 c water
2 c sugar

Instructions:
1. Wash and scrub lemons and lime.
2. Cut into 1/8 inch slices.
2. Bring water and sugar to boil.
3. Gently lower lemon and slices into saucepot.
4. Lower heat to bring water to a simmer.
5. Cover top of water with parchement .
5. Continue to simmer until slices are translucent (approximately 25mins).

ASSEMBLY
1. Layer remaining lemon curd on top of mousse and garnish with candied lemons and a strawberry.

This one didn't turn out as well as I would have hoped, but it still tasted great. I'm glad I started early so that I could refrigerate the lemon curd, but it definitely needs more than an hour to become somewhat firm. After making the curd, I started on the candied lemons and limes. I followed the directions exactly, but for some reason, they didn't turn out. I pulled one out once they were done, and it tasted so bad, I had to spit it out in the trash. I will be looking into some other recipes to candy fruit.

Since the lemons and limes didn't turn out, I added some extra strawberries on top of the assembled product. This was actually really tasty - a good contrast between the sour of the mousse and sweet of the strawberries.


If you try any of the recipes I post on here, please let me know how they turn out for you and what changes you might make.