Time to step out of my comfort zone

I have felt trapped recently with my standard meals, most of which I have cooked since I was in middle school. To get out of my 'recipe rut', I have started to look for new recipes. Pinterest is my best friend for this task. This brings me to my next improvisation.

I tried this recipe tonight, a crawfish rice dressing:
http://www.deepsouthdish.com/2010/12/crawfish-rice-dressing-recipe.html

True to form, I have modified the recipe significantly. First, I used grocery store brand long grain white rice, not the specified brand. Then, I could not find cream of onion soup at the store. I may be blind, or it could just be that it was Sunday afternoon and I could only see about a foot of the humongous soup display at a time because it was so crowded. For the onion soup, I substituted dry onion soup mix combined with milk in the can from the cream of mushroom soup I used. As usual, then it snowballed. Because this substitution was so much less solid than what was originally called for, I was afraid the rice would be too mushy or the liquid would not absorb into the rice fully. SO- I cut the amount of chicken broth called for down to 1 cup from 1.5 cups. Additionally, the season is wrong for crawfish, so I used 1 pound of cooked, frozen salad shrimp, and more than doubled the amount of hot sauce called for. I also chose to omit the crab meat entirely. Once it was assembled, I finally put it in the oven. At the 1 hour mark, the pan was still very moist with liquid pools across the length of the dish. I chose to let it cook for another 15 minutes, checking after 5 minutes. I still had to remove the foil the last 10 minutes of cooking for all the liquid to be fully absorbed into the rice. The rice was a little mushy, but not inedible. After all that-it was super simple to assemble, and I think it has potential to be one of our family favorites. I will definitely be adding it to my repertoire on a regular basis. I will make a few further modifications, though. It needed more cajun seasoning and more bell pepper. However, instead of bell pepper, I think a poblano would add a better flavor. It could probably use a little more hot sauce too. It sounds like I like hot stuff, but that's not necessarily true. This dish had no heat whatsoever-If I thought he would eat it, I would feed it to my 3 year old. I am not sure, but I think the rice or the shrimp might have absorbed some of the heat. or something.

Bonus: It made enough for 2 meals for us!

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Additionally, for breakfast, I made this baked oatmeal today: http://www.sohowsittaste.com/2012/06/blueberry-raspberry-baked-oatmeal.html

I made it almost according to the recipe, closer anyway than the crawfish thing. I subbed honey for maple syrup and peaches for bananas and omitted the walnuts and raspberries. I think the walnuts would taste wonderful; I just didn't have any. If I'd had more time, I would've chopped some almonds and subbed those instead. As it was, the children were in the process of destroying my house and maiming each other, and I figured I should cut my losses and move on. All told, it also turned out awesome. I will definitely make this again as well.

So, today was exceptional in that I tried two new recipes and modified both on the first pass. I must be getting more adventurous or a better cook. or lazier. or maybe, just maybe, all 3.

Happy improvising, y'all!

Chicken Ranch Tacos-Slow cooker style, with modifications

I am going to try to post about once a week, schedule permitting, and I will start with a very tame example of improvisation in cooking (don't want to get too crazy in the first post, in case you scare easily). Mostly, I just love this recipe and want to share it with you. It comes in the form of tacos-always a favorite in our house.

Original Plan/Recipe:
I attempted this recipe: http://pedersenfood.blogspot.com/2011/05/chicken-ranch-tacos.html. The first time I made it, I used the directions I found on a Pinterest pin (where I originally saw it-I spend a LOT of time there. You'll see.) which were already modified. The pin's modification were in keeping with my improvisational spirit-I don't cook much on the stovetop with two small children. That's a recipe for disaster anyway you spin it. They called for 1 can of broth, chicken breasts, packet of ranch and packet of taco seasoning in the crock pot for about 3 hours.

Practical application:
I wanted leftovers to make at least one more meal out of the chicken. Sometimes, increasing the recipe does not translate to exactly twice the ingredients and can end in a disaster. Plus, we all know Pinterest suggestions usually don't have the correct measurements, if they are specified at all. Thankfully,a disaster was not in the cards this time. I used almost 2 lbs of chicken, 32 oz of broth since I didn't have a can but an oversized box of broth in the pantry, and I wanted ALL the chicken in the liquid so it wouldn't dry out. I used 2 packets of ranch and taco seasoning though and let it cook for about two hours longer, about 5 hours total. It turned out awesome, I must say.

Additional modifications:
The second time, I bought a bag of frozen chicken (10lbs) and used 3 packets of each ranch and taco seasoning. I used enough water to cover the chicken (no broth because I didn't have any). I didn't measure at all. I cooked it on high for the first 3 hours and low for 2. It still turned out tasty as ever. I kept out what we'd eat in two days and froze the rest in 1-day portions. Score for bulk cooking! Double score for bulk cooking with almost no extra work!

Today, though, I tried the recipe with water instead of broth and pork roast instead of chicken. It tasted even better as pulled pork carnitas.

YUM!