Apple cider brined chicken

I had a chicken in the freezer and was looking for something interesting to do with it. I know that it's not exactly the season to be cooking with apple cider, but trust me here. This apple cider brined chicken is great any time of the year.

The brine ensures a moist end product, and the cider adds just a touch of spice and sweetness. The recipe called for removing the skin partway through cooking time, but that sounded like a lot of mess and hassle, so I left the skin on. The sugar in the cider made for very crisp and browned skin, so I'm glad I didn't remove it.

I think this would also be great on the grill, I would suggest cooking it over indirect heat to prevent burning.

Quesadillas with poblano rajas

There are not many foods simpler than a quesadilla. Tortillas, cheese, heat, eat. Of course there are many variations on the basic version, and I think my favorite happens to be the addition of poblano rajas. Poblano rajas is a mixture of roasted poblano chiles, onion, garlic and Mexican oregano. I adapted this recipe from Rick Bayless’s Mexican Kitchen.

The recipe starts with poblano peppers. These peppers are pretty mild, but there is some heat packed into the seeds and veins, so take caution when removing those. The peppers are roasted until blackened, peeled, and cut into thin strips.

The onions and garlic are cooked separately in a pan. I like to use a red onion in this recipe because it adds a hint of sweetness.

After the onions and garlic are cooked, the pepper strips are added. The whole mixture is seasoned with salt, pepper and mexican oregano. I keep both Mexican and Mediterranean oregano on hand. If you don’t have Mexican oregano, you can substitute a different variety, but the flavor won’t be exactly the same.

Once the poblano rajas is done, it’s time to assemble the quesadillas. The original recipe calls for corn tortillas and Mexican cheese. I typically use flour tortillas with whatever cheese we have on hand. Not exactly traditional, but convenient and still delicious. This time around, I used flour tortillas with white cheddar and mozzarella cheese, and topped each quesadilla with avocado and cilantro.

Poblano rajas

Makes about 2 cups

1 pound poblano peppers, seeded, roasted and peeled
1 tablespoon canola oil

1 medium red onion
2 garlic cloves

1/2 teaspoon dried oregano, preferably Mexican

salt and pepper to taste

Cut the peppers and onion into 1/4 inch slices. Heat the oil at medium heat in a skillet. Add the red onion, cook for 5-7 minutes until translucent and slightly browned. Add the garlic and cook for another 2-3 minutes. Add the poblanos and oregano to the pan, season with salt and pepper to taste.

Mini cornbread puddings

I pulled this recipe out of Everyday Food magazine a few years ago, and I haven't made another cornbread recipe since. I find that sometimes cornbread can be dry - not these muffins. They're actually called cornbread puddings because they come out so moist.

The recipe starts out with typical cornbread ingredients - flour, cornmeal, baking powder, baking soda, sugar and salt.

The dry ingredients are mixed with an egg and sour cream. The sour cream adds all the moisture, there's no butter involved. I use light sour cream, it works just fine. A generous amount of corn kernels are also stirred into the batter.

The batter is spooned into muffin tins to bake. You can use mini muffin or regular muffin tins. If you go with a regular muffin pan, add a few more minutes to the bake time. Here I used a mini muffin pan, but I almost always go with full sized muffins.

These bake very quickly, and are out of the oven in less than 15 minutes.

I tend to serve the muffins with jam, but they're also great with butter or honey. If you wanted a more savory muffin, you could probably add some minced bell pepper or jalapeno to the recipe.