Recipe Recap #4

Hello friends! Welcome back to my recipe memory lane.  Here are the recipes from the week of February 17 - 23, 2012.

Baked Egg Cups
These have been a great little recipe discovery for us.  So easy and a nice change from PANCAKES! LOL

Chicken Asiago Dijon
Funny, I was just thinking about this recipe.  We haven't made it in a few months, but it certainly is time.  This one was popular in our house last year.

See you next week!

Asiago Quiche Cups - Guest Post by Sherry K from Jazzy Gourmet

First of all, may I say how nice it is to meet all of you out there in Addicted to Recipes land! I am so thrilled to be guest blogging today. In fact, this is my guest blogging debut; so thanks, Dawn, for the opportunity!

My name is Sherry K - pianist, composer, and national cooking contest finalist. I'm also known as the Jazzy Gourmet, because when I'm home, I like to jazz up my meals. I have an array of how-to videos, filled with jazzed up recipes, quick tips, gadget reviews and learn-from-my-mistakes advice.

My friend Bud, our very special spud, is going to help me introduce our recipe for today.

Asiago Quiche Cups with Tomato Jam make a great appetizer or side dish for any meal. We start with thinly sliced potatoes formed into a cup. Then we load the cups with a luscious cheesy quiche filling, topped with tangy tomato jam. Bud says they are so good, you might not be able to stop with just one!
 

Asiago Quiche Cups with Tomato Jam

Tomato Jam:
1 teaspoon olive oil
1/4 cup chopped onion
1 large tomato, peeled and chopped
1/2 teaspoon mustard seed
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 tablespoon molasses
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
a pinch of chili pepper flakes  

Asiago Quiche Cups:
1 large potato, peeled
2 teaspoons olive oil
1/2 teaspoon salt, divided
2/3 cup heavy cream
2 eggs
4 ounces reduced fat cream cheese, softened
3/4 cup grated asiago cheese
1 teaspoon finely chopped fresh rosemary
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
sour cream for garnish
 

For the jam, heat a small saucepan to medium high heat. Add 1 teaspoon olive oil. When the oil begins to shimmer, add the onions and cook for a few minutes until tender. Stir in the tomato, mustard seed, thyme, cinnamon, molasses, vinegar and chili pepper flakes. Turn the heat down to low and simmer until the mixture reduces and becomes thick, about 40-50 minutes.

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees F. While the jam simmers, start making the cups by slicing the potato thinly on a mandolin. Toss the slices with 2 teaspoons olive oil and 1/4 teaspoon salt.

Spray cooking spray onto 8 cups of a 12-cup muffin pan. Divide the potato slices evenly into each of the 8 cups, arranging them to form the outline of the cup. Place in a 375 oven for 15 minutes.

In the meantime, place cream, eggs, cream cheese, asiago cheese, rosemary and pepper in a medium bowl and whisk thoroughly. When the potato cups have cooked for 15 minutes, remove them from the oven and ladle the egg/cheese mixture evenly into each of the 8 cups.

Return to the oven and cook for an additional 20-25 minutes, or until golden and puffy. Remove cups from the oven and garnish with Tomato Jam and sour cream. Serve immediately. Makes 8 cups Watch video here:

Can't see video? Watch it here: Asiago Quiche Cups

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Summertime Pasta with Tomato & Basil

My most favourite cookbook series is the Whitewater Cooks series.  A very dear friend introduced the series to me, and she has given me two of the books as gifts.  My husband bought me the other.  The recipes are great, the photos are lovely, and the books are just beautiful.  The author is from British Columbia (the province where I live) and she uses ingredients that we can easily find, even people who are from smaller towns.  It's great! 

Last summer we had an abundance of tomatoes in our garden.  Last year was a stellar tomato crop, our little garden gave us over 1500 cherry tomatoes (4 different varieties)...I stopped counting at 1500 (yes...I counted, I couldn't believe our crop!).  Everyone had a gazillion tomatoes, so I wasn't able to share our bounty as much as I would have liked.  I turned some into salsa (YUM!) and we ate a lot of salads with tomatoes.  Then I found the recipe for Summertime Pasta in the Whitewater Cooks book.  And it became an instant favourite!  Here is the recipe (it is SO EASY):

½ cup olive oil
3 garlic cloves, sliced or minced (or more if you love garlic)
2 cups cherry tomatoes cut in half
Sea salt (to taste)
Fresh pepper (to taste)
Fresh basil, chopped (to taste)
1 cup asiago cheese
1 package spaghetti or other thin pasta

In the morning, cut cherry tomatoes and chop basil, put into a large bowl. Add salt and pepper to taste (we use Epicure’s Chili Garlic Sea Salt and the 4 Pepper Blend). In a frying pan over medium low heat, heat olive oil. Add garlic to the olive oil. Cook for about a minute, just long enough to infuse the garlic and oil. Transfer oil and garlic to the bowl of tomatoes. Cover with plastic wrap and let the mixture sit at room temperature all day.

At dinnertime, cook and drain your pasta. Add the pasta to the tomato mixture and toss to combine. Serve with freshly grated asiago cheese. If you find asiago cheese too strong, try a different cheese, such as parmesan or mozzarella.

We usually serve the pasta with a grilled chicken, makes for all around nice, healthy meal.

VERDICT:
This dish is a HUGE hit in our house, and I can see it being made regularly over the next while with the tomatoes being harvested.  And it is so easy to make - start it in the morning, let it sit all day, cook up some pasta and grill some meat and dinner is done, just like that!

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Chicken Asiago Dijon

For dinner tonight I made a pasta favourite of ours that we discovered last summer when we had an abundance of tomatoes in the garden - and I needed to find new recipes for those tomatoes.  Typically we serve this dish with grilled chicken, but my husband was in meetings until late tonight so I had to come up with a "Plan B".  A little digging and I found a new recipe...what a surprise!

Before I get into tonight's new recipe, I have to share.  My oldest son is getting in on this project too.  I have my "binder" of collected recipes out and I have been tagging some of them to try.  This afternoon he called me into the living room as he was going through the binder, tagging all the recipes that he wants me to make for our family.  Sooooo cute and so funny, he was very serious about his choices.  I'll have to take a closer look and see if any catch my eye!

Back to today's new recipe.  I don't BBQ (had a bad experience once when I was much younger...I leave the grilling to our resident grill master, aka my husband!), so the grilled chicken was out.  I found a recipe using Panko, which I adjusted to compliment the pasta dish we were having.  Here is the recipe:

Chicken Asiago Dijon

4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1/4 cup butter, melted
1 clove garlic, minced
1/4 cup dijon mustard
1/2 cup Panko
1 tablespoon parmesan cheese (dried)
2 tablespoons asiago cheese, grated
1 tablespoon parsley flakes

In a bowl, mix melted butter, garlic and mustard.  Set aside.

In a pie dish, mix Panko, parmesan cheese, asiago cheese and parsley.

Coat chicken in mustard sauce on both sides; dip chicken in crumb mixture to coat (all sides).  Lay chicken in baking pan (I used a foil lined baking pan with a light layer of olive oil).

Bake at 400F for 25-30 minutes or until chicken is cooked.

VERDICT:
What a delightful surprise!  Warning though, if you are not a fan of stronger cheeses, asiago cheese does have a stronger flavour, you may wish to substitute with a less potent cheese.  We all enjoyed the chicken, it was very tasty, crunchy, and yet seemed light.  We were fighting over the lefotver bits!  Unfortunately the picture doesn't do the meal much justice...but at least it's an idea of what it looks like when cooked!