I could tell who you were when you walked in.

You Bastard.

You had that bizarre awkwardness that’s so common around here, that difficulty in even being in a public space that is so endemic to the university, that I KNEW, just KNEW, that you wanted a fancy drink.  Your fancy clothes told me you were probably one of those pansy Europhile types (anyone who would call soccer “football” can have their soft socialized everything. I’m fine with American pride, thank you), and your utter lack of body fat/muscle/anything except skin and bones told me you were “health-conscious” or whatever it is that all those folks who are too lazy to work out but too miserable to actually want to eat call themselves. Also you had money.  You’re at the University of Chicago.  You have money (okay…some…A FEW people, whom I UNIVERSALLY like more than the alternative type, don’t. I would have been able to tell that, too). 

You wanted a large, skim cappuccino.

Everyday I have those customers for whom it would be so easy for me to just say “NO. We actually don’t have that. It doesn’t exist.”  You want a medium one? I’ll make you the best damn one you’ve ever had.  Even in your fucking corner Starbucks in whatever bleeding-heart coastal city you come from.  There isn’t a goddamn large cappuccino.  There is also no such thing as a Soy cappuccino.  Soy milk doesn’t foam.  Milk needs fat to foam.  Are you lactose-intolerant? Fuck you.  I don’t believe in that (okay…fine.  Some people are.  I acknowledge that. I’ll make them soy whatever-they-want.  At least they make the effort.  Most “lactose-intolerants” are just whiners who want attention).  And 2% milk isn’t gonna ruin that diet that you clearly tell people you are on way more than you follow.  Is it five minutes to closing and you want a double macchiato? Oh, is that for here? Fuck you.  I’m closing in five.  No, don’t give me that sad face.  I don’t care.  My job is to clean, not spoil you like whatever indulgent effete society you came from across the pond.

Why isn’t your macchiato “like a smoothie?” Because I’m not a fucking starbucks.  I make the good kind of coffee drinks.  Not that abomination.  I like good coffee.  Starbucks is incapable of doing anything but burnt coffee or melted candy bars. 

Do you want an Au Lait? You’re goddamn spoiled.  You can’t just put milk in your coffee? It needs to be warmed first? Really?

I keep long mental lists of these things all day at the cafe.  I have lists of my “enemies” (I actually don’t have any at THIS cafe…people here are nice.  At the one I learned at though…woof.  Nah, I just know who’s gonna cost my 5-10 minutes every time because of some special picky beverage they want, and then never fucking tip).  I also have lists of my “friends”-people I want to see at the cafe.  These are people who just want a cup of coffee, or get a latte or some other drink but are particularly nice, or some ultra fancy drink but are really nice and tip. 

I adjust accordingly.  Are you an enemy? Your cappuccino is gonna be quick and dirty. I want to not waste as much time as you are going to make me.  Are you a friend? I will take the extra time to make your latte as good as I know how.  And believe me.  I can make it good.  Do I want to sometimes tell you that “yes, ms, I like you but there is no such thing as a large soy cappuccino and I KNOW you aren’t lactose intolerant so don’t be so goddamn snobby?” Sure.  But I like you, so I still enjoy when you come in. 

I was trained at a fancy coffee shop, among half rich white people and half of my people close to where my parents lived.  I learned all about drinking coffee and tasting coffee and making coffee.  I learned to appreciate a simple cup of black coffee more than anything.  I learned to appreciate the sparking crispness of the South American coffees, the winey richness of the African, the balance of Oceanian.  I learned what a great treat Kenyan coffee is, and how beautiful it makes your morning to have real Kona coffee. REAL Kona Coffee.  The kind we had to get direct and ship to the micro-roaster because everyone else cheats.  That Kona you get in the store? It’s like…25% Kona, maybe. It’s…good.  100% Kona is devine.  I learned how a dark roasted Peru is surprisingly delicious, and the difficulty of finding an appropriate time to use a dark coffee.  The drinks I made there were works of art.  I learned latte art, how to shit-talk customers, how to diffuse tension.  The customers there were pieces of shit.  I got the snottiest, most pretentious, picky people.  At the cafe I work out now, much as I complain, I have only wanted to cuss out ONE customer, who was this moron lady who got her 8-year old a “too spicy” sandwich because (to her 8-year-old who just wanted McNuggets) “you like prosciutto, don’t you? It’s right up your alley!” All I have to say to that is- bitch, when you have problems with your poor daughter in 10 years, don’t fucking ask me why. 

At the old cafe, I wanted to Cuss Out 3 out of every 5 customers. Much as the automated system makes me sick with the routine drinks I churn out, and the emphasis on speed rarely allows to me to make the beautiful lattes I used to, I am a social person and baristaing is a social job.  The flirting, the talking, the passive aggression, the aggressive aggression, it all makes the job bearable.  This cafe is much better.  Also my bosses are better.  So, I guess I owe most of my customers a thank you.  Keep it up.  Probably being working students/teachers/artists/researchers instead of the idle rich helps. 

Sorry about that.  I was reading Bourdain at work the other day, and this just came out of my head. 

If you are going to come to the 505, and let’s be honest, with our tourism rate, some of you are, late fall is one of the best times.  The weather is cool and crisp, the mountain air is fresh, it’s toward the end of big tourist seasons, and most importantly, there is a unique smell in the air.  It’s a smell that makes the gringos choke and cough and wheeze because they are actually inhaling mace.  It’s also a smell that makes the locals REALLY, REALLY hungry. 

It’s the smell of roasting green chile. 

Because I had to do that for the first time, I will tell you how.  However, if you buy a sack in the 505, get Los Chile Bros. (in front of Lowes, on St. Mike’s and Llano) to roast it.  You buy a sack, and for the price they put it in an interesting machine that roasts it well.  Those guys do it the best.  They also sell excellent chile.

If you have to do it at home, it’s trickier. 

There are two ways to do this: one is in the oven, the other on the stove.  I used the stove: my mother attempted to oven method, and it failed. Don’t do this.  Of course, the stove method is difficult. Really, really difficult.  You need a large, flat pan.  I used this nifty griddle-skillet thing we got from MC’s mom.  It did the job great.  You could also use a large frying pan.  Put it on the stove on high heat for a nice long time until the pan is heated up.   Once the pan is HOT, layer some of your chiles evenly so there is one layer, and let them cook.  This takes lots of attention: you need to press down on the pods so the entire surface gets burned black, while also making sure that you don’t get any explosions.  They do puff up with gas or something, and you will need to occasionally poke a hole in one to let the pressure out.  When the side you are working with is completely cooked, rotate the pods and repeat until they are mostly blackened all the way around.  Once you are done with this step, place the pods in a colander in the sink, and run cold water over them, because they will be VERY hot.

This next step will either be REALLY easy, or REALLY difficult, depending on how well you roasted the pods.  If you did a good job roasting the pods, then the skin will slough (now isn’t THAT a gross word) itself off just through gentle rubbing.  If you did a poor job roasting, then peeling the skin will be a nightmare of picking off the tiny bits you can grab until the pod is MOSTLY deskinned. Expect like twenty minutes per pod if you did a poor job, and just a few seconds if you did a good job.  Also at this stage, use a knife to remove the stems and seeds (called troncones). 

I like to do this step in tandem with the next few batches of roasting.  It’s a lot of running back and forth between the stove and the sink. 

Once you are done peeling and roasting all the pods, your house will smell delicious.  Or toxic.  I think delicious.  Many, many people think toxic. 

These guys also freeze spectacularly: I like to put six in a little Ziploc bag (six is a good number for one meal), and then put a bunch of these bags in the freezer.  To thaw them, either leave them out for a bit or take them out of the bag and put them on a plate and microwave for 5 minutes or so.  Usually, when you put them on stuff, you chop them up into little squares, about 1 centimeter by 1 or 2 centimeters. 

A good use for green chile is in a green enchilada.  These ones taste really great with chicken added. 

The way you do this is first, boil a chicken until it is cooked. Normally, I would NEVER advocate boiling meat. It makes it terribly soft and robs it of a certain degree of flavor.  That is exactly what you want in this case, though.  Even so, I like to add a little chicken broth to the water just to mitigate the chance of loss of flavor. 

Once it is done, shred the chicken, and save the broth (the water you cooked it in).  This is easy, since you boiled it: the chicken should really just shred itself, with a little encouraging by peeling the meat away from itself with a knife and fork. 

Boil a cup of broth, and add 2 cans of cream of mushroom soup.  Mix these together.  To this, add the chicken and the chopped green chile (like 3 or 4). Let this boil for a bit, but just long enough to mix the flavors (30 mins).  It will not be thick like the red chile sauce. 

While this boils, make sure you have a few dozen corn tortillas, a pound or so of shredded sharp cheddar, and a whole onion, chopped finely.  

To assemble the enchilada, first place a layer of corn tortillas on the bottom of a large casserole dish: fry them in oil first.  This is pretty easy: boil some oil, and cook the tortillas in it for a few seconds on each side.  You don’t want to fry them too much, or you get taco shells. This is just to soften them up.  Cover that layer with the chile mixture (get it out using a slotted spoon: that way you get the chile and the chicken, but none of the juice. You don’t want a soggy enchilada!!) Cover this with a layer of cheese and onion.  Repeat until you run out of some ingredient, or you are at the top of the casserole (this takes me 4 layers or so). 

Cooking this is the same as the red enchilada. It also saves in the fridge just as well. 

On a side note, I just had a little green chile pepper, about the size and shape of my pinky, which brought me to tears.  DAMN I missed NM foods.    

Oh, wow. That was a long gap. I’m truly sorry.  But, as promised, here follows both the recipe for Red Chile and one of my favorite uses for it (other than to put on everything). 

Down in the 505, we have one question for you: Red or Green? If your answer is “what?” we laugh, because then you are a gringo/a. 

If you are shocked because there isn’t beans or meat in your chile, same thing. 

If it’s too hot for you, then we REALLY laugh.

Right now, I’m laughing because my computer thinks I’m spelling “chile” wrong.  Pinche gringo computer. 

Anyhow, to make chile, you start with a ristra, one of those picturesque long chains of red chile.  Gringos love to see these things, because they think that they are a beautiful decoration and make them look more and more “authentico.”  Us locals like to see them too, but every time we see one, we are thinking: ¿Por qué no es el chile dry yet?.

You hang the ristra, and let the thing dry.  Once that happens, you clear 2-3 hours.  Once the chile is dry, the next step is to remove the stems and seeds from each chile pod.  Do this with a knife, carving out around the stem.  The seeds should be attached, rinse out the pod to make sure you remove the stragglers.  After you do this with ALL of them, lay them out in a single layer on a cookie tray, and place them in an oven, heated to 250, for 3-5 minutes.  Depending on how much chile you have, this may take several batches.  The trick here is just to slightly coax the flavor out. YOU DO NOT WANT TO ROAST OR TOAST THE CHILE. That makes it taste godawful.  After this, place the chile in a large pot full of boiling water just until it is very soft (you don’t want to boil the flavor out).  Then, place a few pods in a blender…about enough that they fill a quarter of the blender.  Then, fill the blender slightly above the level of the chile with the water you boiled it in (this preserves flavor).  Blend this for 15 minutes: once they begin to blend, put 2 medium cloves of garlic in, a pinch of salt, and a pinch of oregano (you just want barely the slightest hint of all these flavors).  Adjust by adding water or pods until the sauce is the thickness of Campbell’s tomato soup.  Empty the blender into a freezer-safe plastic case.  You will do this many, many times.  Keep some in the freezer- it freezes great, and it’s delicious.  

A note on freezing chile: the stuff freezes very well, and keeps in the freezer very well.  However, when you thaw it, the chile may separate from the water, and this may look a little weird.  But when you cook it, it blends itself back together and looks pretty.

The last step is super easy: just fry until brown a pinch of flour in a pinch of oil, and add the chile, and about half the container it was in of water, bring to a boil, and let it simmer for 15 min or until it boils down to the desired consistency (again, think Campbell’s tomato soup).  

Now: red enchiladas.  There are several different types of enchilada: Tex-Mex, New-Mex, and just Mex.  TexMex cooking is a hybrid of Texan and Mexican cooking, NewMex is a hybrid of Spanish and Native American with a hint of Mexican, and Mex is Mexican.  NewMex are easily the best.  

To do them, shred like a pound of sharp cheddar.  Slice an onion very finely, and fry a pound of ground beef.  You’ll also need a whole mess of corn tortillas (count on using between 12 and 24).

Some people like to fry the corn tortillas.  I used to, until I learned this better method from my mother’s aunt: instead of frying them, dip them in the chile (this lessens fat, and makes the whole thing taste more of chile).  Layer the bottom of a large casserole dish with the tortillas, then layer beef, then cheese, then onions, then chile.  Repeat until you run out of something or until the casserole is full. Finish with a layer of cheese for aesthetics’s sake.  I usually get 3-4 layers to fill a dish.  

Bake at 350 until the cheese on top is melted and the chile around the edge is just starting to bubble.  While baking is the last step, what’s nice about these is that you can save them in a fridge until you are ready to bake them.    

Next, Green Chile and the corresponding enchilada!  

First, allow me to start by saying that the fact that the post below this one exists is awesome.

Second, please accept my sincerest apologies that this post didn’t exist earlier.  Pasta Carbonara is one of my signature recipes, and as far as easy, cheap, and delicious goes, I personally do not have one more fitting this description in my repertoire.  

Carbonara is, essentially, pasta with a sh.tload of bacon in it.  I’m sure you have both of these necessities in your fridge/pantry (i HOPE the bacon isn’t in your pantry)…if not, go get some. For this recipe, you’ll need a pound of pasta, a pound of bacon, and 3 eggs.  That’s it. I’m not kidding. 

First, you boil the pasta in lightly salted water.  While the water is coming to a boil and the pasta is cooking, chop the pound of bacon into little (1/4 inch x 1/4 inch, or so) squares.  Fry these, until they are JUST starting to get crispy (but NO MORE. No one wants crunchy carbonara!).  Beat the three eggs together with a pinch of salt.

If you don’t do these next steps QUICKLY, they won’t work: when the pasta is done, drain it, return it to the pan, and toss in the bacon.  Immediately toss in the beaten eggs.  Stir this so the bacon is distributed evenly, and there is no raw egg remaining (if you did this fast enough, the heat from the pasta should cook the egg into a coat over everything.  If you didn’t do this fast enough, don’t worry: turn the heat back on, as low as you can, and keep stirring until the egg is all the way cooked).

I, being New Mexican, like to eat this with some chile.  It’s also good with fresh ground black pepper and parmesan cheese, if you are from the other 49. 

Speaking of Chile, stay tuned: I just got a shipment, and pretty soon will be posts with my ULTIMATE signature recipes: Red and Green Chile sauces, as well as Enchiladas made with said sauces. 

Greetings from across the pond, dear friends!

You would be very disappointed with the state of our kitchen here in the residence hall, and we have been struggling to make do with no frying pan and pots so thin the bottoms burn instantly and no sharp knives and general kitchen travesties.

However! We have had a true success, both in the “more or less cheap” and “totally delicious” categories. And what was that, dear readers? A variation on none other than our tried-and-true bullshit pot pie.

This meal cost about £2 ($3 USD). What we used: £1 package of stew veggies (parsnip, four carrots, onion, leek), 30p package of pancake mix, a few potatoes from a £1 package, some garlic and olive oil we had, and a 50p can of cream of chicken soup. Also, what limited spices we have - salt, pepper, cumin.

Everything was done the same - we stir-fried all of the veggies (and by stir-fried, I mean I stirred a small pot on the stove almost overflowing with veggies while the bottom burned despite my best efforts) until the potatoes were beginning to soften, then added the can of cream of chicken soup. In the pancake mix, we used some EVOO and water, and when the potatoes were getting close to being edible we dumped the veggies in a pan and spread the pancake mix over it. We then guessed a temperature (guess what, ovens are in Celsius), put it in the oven, and let it cook until we discovered the top was cooked.

The top of the pie ended up feeling a bit like a spongy pancake (not as gross as it sounds, I assure you), but it absorbed the chicken soup nicely and all of the veggies were cooked through. Very cheap, nice flavor, and it only requires effort if none of your knives are suitably sharp.

Cheers!

My, my, it’s been a while.  And this post will be quick, because to make it is one of the easiest and most rewarding experiences I think you will ever have.  

These are perhaps my favorite breakfast item ever - and, in fact, everyone in the world’s (except Claire’s, or Anemictarians) favorite breakfast item ever.  They are called, The Bacon Waffle.  

I was introduced to these poorly, at a normally delicious roadhouse diner near my folks’ house in Santa Fe.  They were serving blue corn pancakes with bacon in them.  They were gross.  This was the fault of the blue corn: it is a more mealy, rougher corn flour than white or yellow, what we are used to.  So, it makes great pancakes, and better tortillas, but foul waffles.  My mother thought the poor taste was the fault of the bacon.  Being a man, I knew that nothing bad is the fault of the bacon.  So, I went hunting for normal waffles with bacon (turns out they’re everywhere and SUPER DELICIOUS).

Now, if you want to make them at home, all you’ll need is Bisquick, bacon, and whatever the Bisquick tells you to use for waffle mix (some milk, some egg, and some oil).  Make the waffle mix normally, and put it on your waffle iron (get one.  They make mornings awesome).  Only, put only half the amount of mix you would use (like half a large ladle on the iron, then put two halves of a slice of bacon on top, then the other half of the mix.  Close the iron, and let it do its job (usually 8-12 minutes, depending on your iron).  Then add syrup and butter, and enjoy!

So, my people, I caved.  I have just gotten home from enjoying (and I do mean that), a truly vegan meal.  And it was good.  I had a Reuben at the Chicago Diner, a vegan place (and I LOVE Reubens).  They asked if I wanted “dairy cheese” or vegan “cheeze,” and I figured…well, fuck it.  Go big or go home.  So I got a vegan meal.  And it was damn good.  I mean… I went to the Lincoln Park Zoo earlier today, which is all free, all the time, and there were cows, one of whom was being milked.  They are pretty damn cute, in that massive-and-barely-sentient sort of way. 

That’s not to say I don’t eat meat.  Hell no.  I love me some flesh.  That’s why I’m doing this post: so I can educate you about how to cook beef right, and how to make this excellent burger I made the other night. 

Now, I like my meat rare.  And like…REALLY rare. Not like bullshit diner I-said-rare-this-is-medium-where’s-the-blood.  A lot of this, for practical purposes, is time cooking.  The best burger joint in the country (actually) is in Santa Fe, and uses this complex system of weights. They are still the only place that ACTUALLY knows what each step in the scale means.  But that’s too hard, and I have no idea what they do.  The scale, you may want to know, goes, from least-to-most cooked, rare, medium rare, medium, medium well, and well done.  I ALWAYS RECOMMEND RARE or if you’re scared of that salmonella or whatever-the-f***-it’s-called myth, go medium rare.  Medium and anything above sacrifices the flavor of the meat for the “flavor of the heat”- you get more taste of cooking process (like char, or burnt meat) than beef flavor. 

A rare burger should be pink through and through, with a cooked outside and a raw center.  To achieve this, cook a quarter pound patty (easiest to work with) for 3 minutes on each side. 

Medium rare is cooked a tiny bit of the way in, but is primarily pink, but lacks the raw center of a rare burger.  To do this, cook for 5 minutes on one side, and 3 on the other. 

Medium has a pinkish center, but is mostly cooked.  For this, cook for 6-7 minutes on one side, and 4 on the other.

Medium well is cooked through and through, and the outside should have some char.  This should be cooked for 8 minutes on one side and 5 on the other. 

Well done has a very charred outside, and is very well cooked through and through.  This takes 8-9 minutes on each side. 

To make a standard hamburger patty, just get some ground beef, and using the knowledge of how much you started with, make quarter pound balls (1lb will give you 4, etc), and flatten them into a burger shape, but just a tiny bit fatter because they WILL shrink during cooking.  Season with salt and pepper, then cook as above!

What I made, however, were blue cheese and butter stuffed burgers.  Blue cheese and beef does wonders together, and the butter worked to both add a lovely flavor and hold the meat together around the crumbly cheese. This was a simple modification: instead of flattening the balls into burger shapes, I flattened them into very long, thin “patties,”- like what they’d look like if I’d cut a burger in half and filleted it.  I put 1tbsp of butter and 1 tbsp of blue cheese on half of the “fillet,” and folded it over.  Make sure this seals well!  You don’t want any cheese or butter escaping during the cooking.  The idea is that the burger has a buttery blue cheese nougaty center. 

And that’s it! You grill it as above, and you’re done!

Our vegetarian that night ate fish, so I did the same, except instead of beef I used salmon.  Whenever you do burgers of salmon and turkey or some meat that has less fat than a cow, you need to add some bread to the patties so they hold together.  With fish, you need to add a slice per serving of fish: for poultry its closer to a slice per half-pound.  Tear up the slice real small and mash it in with the meat…after that shape it exactly as you would beef.  Salmon burgers cook much faster than beef, usually 4 minutes on each side and they’re fully cooked. 

Awesome.

I love tacos.  They are delicious, easy, and can be made with generally anything.  Here follows a guide on how to make an ideal, authentic taco.

What’s authentic? For instance: I didn’t really know that people used pre-made taco shells until I was in high school.  Oh well. 

The way you SHOULD do this is simple: put a lot of oil in a small frying pan, and leave it over medium-high heat until the oil is very hot.  Place a corn tortilla in the oil for a few seconds, then flip it.  You don’t want it hardened, but you want it crispy.  A good way to tell when it’s ready to flip is that it starts to puff up.  Remove it from the oil, and place it on a plate with a paper towel to catch the oil, folding it in half as you place it (this way, it will harden into what a shell should look like). They won’t be very hard like taco bell shells, but they’ll be a little crispy.  Is this foreign to you? I’m sure it is…but trust me. It’s better this way (you know what’s GREAT? get one of these, and put some cheese and salt in it). 

Another authentic tip? Delicious, homestyle seasoned taco beef is achieved very easily: pan-fry some ground beef with some taco seasoning (seriously.  This is how my grandmother has always done it.  Awesome, huh?), about 1 tbsp per pound of meat. 

For the vegetarians, I just heat some canned black beans, stirring in about half a tablespoon of seasoning per two cans (mixing some of this with some beef is pretty tasty also, if you aren’t a vegetarian)

And that’s it!  I like to top mine with cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, salsa, and sour cream (which is what is commonly used, and I recommend).

Now I realize that this dish is not exactly what I’d call bullshitty at all, as it follows a set recipe, nearly exactly. 

However, I’m including it as an example of something which is delicious, easy, and cheap, and, most importantly, an example of the genius who is Ms. Paula Deen. 

For those of you who don’t know, Paula Deen is a Food Network, et al superpersonality.  She’s an excellent cook, whose dishes are primarily southern influenced.  Now, I generally prefer southwestern (and these are NOT the same.  I’m honestly shocked how often people think they are) dishes, but let’s be real.  There’s no good southwestern food anywhere on TV (because, simply, our chile is just too hot for you.  You’ll see in a few weeks when I get a ristra and do one of these on chile, and on a smaller note, enchiladas). 

Anyhow, Ms. Deen does real American food (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zv8yEMRDe_w).  She has said, “One of a Southern girl’s very favorite ingredients – melted butter. Can’t have too much melted butter.”  God bless her.  This is her fried chicken -  Oh, it’ll clog your arteries.  But wouldn’t YOU want to go down with a delicious taste in your mouth? I know I would. 

You’ll need (for four people.  Often, I’ll double this; it’s my go-to big-group dinner), around 4lbs of frying chicken (you can either get a small chicken and cut it, which is an exceedingly difficult skill I’m STILL working on, or get a package of a cut chicken.  It will have 2 wings, drumsticks, breasts, and thighs.  I often just get drumsticks and thighs. Wings are often too small for practical purposes, and thighs take ages to cook), 1/2 cup salt, 1/8 cup black pepper, 1/8 cup garlic powder, 6 eggs, 2/3 cup water, 1 1/2 cups hot sauce, 3 cups flour, and another 1 1/2 teaspoon black pepper.

First, mix the salt, 1/8 cup black pepper, and garlic powder together.

Beat the eggs and water together, then beat in the hot sauce.  Again, you should use a good tangy cooking sauce (Texas Pete’s and Louisiana are awesome, so is Frank’s if you wanna rep the 312).  You’ll get a bright orange-red mixture.  In another bowl, mix the flour and remaining black pepper. 

Heat some oil in a large frying pan.  You want to use plenty of oil, as we’re going for a less-fatty simulation of deep-frying.  So you want a good coating along the bottom of the pan, but not much more.  If you have a deep fryer, USE IT.  That’ll be so damn good. MMM.

Once the oil is hot, take each piece of chicken, and season it with the salt-pepper-garlic mixture.  You should treat this as a rub (which you normally use as a grilling process to both season and tenderize with a dry spice mix.  To do this, grab a very large pinch of the mixture, and rub it into one side of the chicken, and then the other side.  You want it lightly coated, but not covered.  If there’s too much, this will be grossly salty.  If not enough, you’re losing some delicious flavor).  Dredge the chicken in the egg mixture, then coat with the flour mixture.  Drop each piece in the oil, and let it fully cook… this should take about 11 minutes on one side, and 8 on the other.  As always, slice a fatty piece to make sure it’s cooked through (the chicken should be white through and through).  Since you can only get about 4-6 pieces in a pan, and will have 3 times that probably, I like to keep them warm by placing them on a baking sheet with wax paper in the oven heated to 250.  This also makes them moist and crispy. 

That’s all for the chicken! 

However, as this was a meat dish, and two vegetarians were eating, I substituted the chicken for Portabella mushroom tops.  I like to use these or zucchini for a meat substitute: they don’t ruin the flavor of what you’re putting on the meat.  For the mushrooms, cook them about 4 minutes on one side and 3on the other.  You want the breading cooked, and the mushroom softened but still firm enough that it isn’t flaccid.

A NOTE ON THE SALAD:

It’s easy to make a salad: chop up a lettuce base, then throw in whatever veggies you have to chop.  This one has cucumbers, and carrots.  An easy and tasty one is a sharp lettuce like romaine, blue cheese, craisins, and almonds.  MMM.