Garlic and Fresh Oregano Grilled Chicken

The husband, boys, and I were all out front recently while the husband and I worked on cleaning up the garage and the boys rode bikes. My friend and neighbor Claudine happened to stop by on her way to work to give me some fresh oregano she had just picked from her garden. Don't you just love neighbors like that?! I heart fresh oregano and was overwhelmed with choices of what I could do with it. Something Greek? Italian? I didn't know. I thought some kind of really fresh, light marinade for chicken would be good, so I did some Googling. I found a couple recipes that sounded tasty and ended up making a modified version of one from about.com.

Garlic and Fresh Oregano Grilled Chicken
Source: Adapted from About.com

1/4 cup olive oil
6 cloves coarsely chopped garlic
1/2 cup coarsely chopped fresh oregano leaves
1 tablespoon Balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoons fresh lime juice
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
1 tablespoon honey
2 teaspoon ancho powder

Combine all ingredients in a mixing bowl. Mix until thoroughly combined. Marinate chicken for 6 hours or more. Prepare indirect grill and cook until done. Makes enough marinade for 2 chickens quartered.

*****

The original recipe called for half a cup of garlic. That seemed like waaaaaay too much to me. Plus I didn't have that much garlic. I love me some garlic, but half a cup? Really?! I basically used what I had and called it good. I also went light on the ancho chile powder since Boy #1 isn't a fan of spicy. I used chicken legs as my chicken part of choice and grilled them for close to 30 minutes. I had quite a bit of marinade left over, so I thawed a chicken breast and left it marinating overnight and then grilled it in the morning for the husband to take in his lunch. I warned him he shouldn't get used to freshly grilled meat every morning.

This marinade was good, but it wasn't amazing I didn't think. For chicken breasts I think I like my Saito Chicken better, and we really loved the Marinated Grilled Chicken Legs that we had recently. If you have the ingredients on hand, this is worth making, but I think if Claudine ever graces me with more fresh oregano I'll find something different to make with it.

Marinated Grilled Chicken Legs

I have to say, I'm on a roll with the new Cooking Light recipes I've been trying. So much so that the husband said we should have Cooking Light Month at our house. I gotta say, I'm not opposed to the idea. Three of the six recipes I still need to post about are CL recipes and were all tasty. I don't remember how I came across this one. I think it was an article on their website about 101 ways to cook chicken or something. Boy #1 LOVES chicken legs, and they were on sale last week, so I thought this would be good. It's pretty funny because he calls them "chicken bones." Let me tell you, it took awhile to figure out what he meant when he was asking for chicken bones.

Marinated Grilled Chicken Legs
Source: Cooking Light website

1 cup fresh orange juice
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
4 teaspoons low-sodium soy sauce
1 tablespoon dry sherry
1 1/2 teaspoons bottled minced garlic
1 1/2 teaspoons balsamic vinegar
1 1/2 teaspoons basil oil
1 teaspoon onion powder
1 teaspoon dark sesame oil
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon hot pepper sauce
8 chicken drumsticks (about 2 1/4 pounds), skinned
Cooking spray
Green onion strips (optional)

Combine the first 11 ingredients in a large zip-top plastic bag. Add chicken to bag; seal. Marinate in refrigerator 2 hours, turning bag occasionally.

Prepare grill.

Remove chicken from bag, reserving marinade. Place reserved marinade in a small saucepan; cook over medium heat 3 minutes. Place chicken on grill coated with cooking spray; grill 30 minutes or until chicken is done, turning and basting occasionally with reserved marinade. Garnish with green onion strips, if desired.

Amount per serving (2 drumsticks)
Calories: 215
Calories from fat: 31%
Fat: 7.5g
Saturated fat: 1.8g
Monounsaturated fat: 2.8g
Polyunsaturated fat: 1.8g
Protein: 30g
Carbohydrate: 4.4g
Fiber: 0.1g
Cholesterol: 97mg
Iron: 1.5mg
Sodium: 339mg
Calcium: 18mg

*****

I figure since the nutritional info was there I might as well include in case anyone else is counting calories like we are.

This chicken was REALLY good. The only thing I left out was the basil oil because I don't have any and didn't really want to buy any for the small amount that is used. Although in hindsight I probably could have just bought some fresh basil and made my own. Oh well. I used sriracha for the hot sauce and was worried I'd added too much, but it wasn't spicy at all. Dodged a bullet there because Boy #1 does not like spicy and would have been very disappointed if he couldn't eat the chicken bones.

We all really liked this. I wished I'd thrown a few more legs into the marinade so I could have had another and/or some leftovers. This will definitely be a go to recipe for chicken bones in the future!

Pioneer Woman's Spicy Roasted Chicken Legs

I know I have a ton of posts to go back and catch up on, but I figure it's better to start with the current and then move backwards, otherwise I'll get overwhelmed thinking about it and sit in the corner in the fetal position rocking back and forth. Maybe not quite that severe, but I have put off updating the ol' blog here for awhile because it overwhelmed me to think about what all I wanted to post. Sigh.

I was recently looking at the Pioneer Woman's website and saw this recipe for chicken legs. I had a package of them out in the freezer, so it seemed the stars aligned. Plus I had everything on hand to make them, which was a bonus because I was trying to use up things I had here because my freezer, pantry, and fridge all seemed to be overflowing.

If you want to see all of PW's nice pictures, here's the recipe on her website. I'm a slacker and forgot to take pictures. Oops.

Pioneer Woman's Spicy Roasted Chicken Legs

24 whole Chicken Legs
2 sticks Butter
1 Tablespoon Hot Salt (or You Favorite Seasonings)
½ cups Lemon Juice (or To Taste)

Melt 2 sticks of butter in a saucepan. Pour ½ cup of lemon juice (fresh or bottled). Now add your seasonings. In this case, 1 tablespoon of Morton’s Hot Salt. You can use whatever seasonings makes your skirt fly up, be it minced garlic, salt and Cayenne pepper … let your imagination run wild. Stir it together until combined.

Rinse and pat your chicken legs dry. With metal tongs, transfer them one by one into the butter mixture and place on a baking sheet. Once all of the chicken legs are coated and on the baking rack, take a pastry brush and give them one last coating of the butter mixture. Sprinkle them with some more of your seasonings.

Place them into a 400-degree oven for 30 minutes. If they need a bit more color, turn on the broiler for a couple minutes and watch them closely. Remove them when they are nice and golden brown.

*****

I was going to get the Hot Salt when I went grocery shopping yesterday, but I decided to stay home and hang out with the husband instead of going to the store, so I worked with what I had. I went with Tony Chachere's because everything is better with some Tony's on it. I also added in some garlic powder and Lawry's seasoning salt just for kicks. I kept the Tony's pretty minimal because the boy doesn't dig on spicy. I probably could have stepped it up a little because you couldn't really taste it at all.

This was a super easy chicken recipe, and we all really liked it. My kids love eating drumsticks...God sure got it right when he made that part of the chicken for us to eat, didn't He. It's such a perfect kid food with its built in handle and all. I didn't have 24 drumsticks, I think there were more like 15 in my package. It was quite a lot for my family of four. I only used one stick of butter, which was plenty.

This is something I'll definitely make again. In fact, chicken legs are on sale this week at my grocery, so I may just pick up another package when I'm there today.

Again, sorry there's no picture...but check out PW's website if you want to see better pictures than I take anyway. ;)

White Pizzas with Arugula

Here's the other Barefoot Bloggers recipe for August. A picture of this recipe is on the back cover of the Back to Basics cookbook, and it's always looked super tasty to me. I was excited that this was one of the recipe choices!

White Pizzas with Arugula

For the dough:
* 1 1/4 cups warm (100 to 110) water
* 2 packages dry yeast
* 1 tablespoon honey
* Good olive oil
* 4 cups all-purpose flour, plus extra for kneading
* Kosher salt
* 4 cloves garlic, sliced
* 5 sprigs fresh thyme
* 1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes

For the topping:
* 3 cups grated Italian fontina cheese (8 ounces)
* 1 1/2 cups grated fresh mozzarella cheese (7 ounces)
* 11 ounces creamy goat cheese, such as montrachet, crumbled

For the vinaigrette:
* 1/2 cup good olive oil
* 1/4 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
* Freshly ground black pepper
* 8 ounces baby arugula
* 1 lemon, sliced

Combine the water, yeast, honey and 3 tablespoons of olive oil in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a dough hook. When the yeast is dissolved, add 3 cups of flour, then 2 teaspoons salt, and mix on medium-low speed. While mixing, add up to 1 more cup of flour, or just enough to make a soft dough. Knead the dough for about 10 minutes until smooth, sprinkling it with the flour as necessary to keep it from sticking to the bowl.

When the dough is ready, turn it out onto a floured board and knead it by hand a dozen times. It should be smooth and elastic. Let it rise. Place the dough in a well-oiled bowl and turn it to cover it lightly with oil. Cover the bowl with a kitchen towel and allow the dough to rise at room temperature for 30 minutes.

Place 1/2 cup of olive oil, the garlic, thyme and red pepper flakes in a small saucepan and bring to a simmer over low heat. Cook for 10 minutes, making sure the garlic doesn't burn. Set aside.

Preheat the oven to 500 degrees. (Be sure your oven is clean!)

Dump the dough onto a board and divide it into 6 equal pieces. Place the doughs on sheet pans lined with parchment paper and cover them with a damp towel. Allow the dough to rest for 10 minutes. Use immediately, or refrigerate for up to 4 hours.

Press and stretch each ball into an 8-inch circle and place 2 circles on each sheet pan lined with parchment paper. (If you've chilled the dough, take it out of the refrigerator approximately 30 minutes ahead to let it come to room temperature.)

Brush the pizzas with the garlic oil, and sprinkle each one liberally with salt and pepper. Sprinkle the pizzas evenly with fontina, mozzarella and goat cheese. Drizzle each pizza with 1 tablespoon more of the garlic oil and bake for 10 to 15 minutes, until the crusts are crisp and the cheeses begin to brown.

Meanwhile, whisk together 1/2 cup of olive oil, the lemon juice, 1 teaspoon salt and 1/2 teaspoon pepper.

When the pizzas are done, place the arugula in a large bowl and toss with just enough lemon vinaigrette to moisten. Place a large bunch of arugula on each pizza and a slice of lemon and serve immediately.

*****

The only thing I changed up was that I used my quick homemade pizza crust recipe instead of the dough/crust recipe here. Mostly because I didn't want six pizzas, I just wanted one and knew what size crust I'd get with my recipe. And it doesn't have to rise/rest for very long, so I didn't have to get it together way in advance. Getting things together in advance is not my strong suit! Oh, and I didn't have fresh thyme, so I just sprinkled in some dried. I was bummed because I really like fresh thyme, but I couldn't find it at either store I was at yesterday (Walmart and Trader Joe's...I actually didn't look at Walmart because I figured TJ's would have it...that's the first time TJ's has let me down...sigh.).

*****

Wow. WOW. This pizza was so yummy!! The husband was darn near drooling looking at the piles of shredded cheese on the counter when I was assembling the pizza. I ended up only putting the arugula on half of the pizza because the husband seemed really skeptical of it, and I didn't know if the boy would eat it that way. I LOVED it with the arugula on top...I love the peppery bite of arugula and with the lemon and olive oil mixed in it added a great flavor and texture to the pizza. I honestly thought the bites I had with just cheese and no arugula were a little too cheesy--and that's not something I say very often, if ever! We all really liked this, and this will definitely be a pizza I make again!

(Picture to come later once I get it uploaded!)

Grilled Caesar Salad

Sorry it's taken me so long to get back into the blog updating game. We got home from my cousin's wedding last Monday night, but I was super lazy all last week. Then the husband and I had our first overnight date night this past weekend since before the baby was born! It was fantastic!! Now today I'm trying to get back into the groove of everything. Really I could use a day to recover from the weekend, but what are you going to do.

I wasn't really sure what to do for dinner tonight because I don't think I'm going grocery shopping until after the boy goes to bed, so I needed to come up with something that I already had the ingredients for. I bought romaine hearts at Costco last week and remembered seeing recipes for grilled romaine. I thought a caesar salad would be a nice, light dinner for tonight since we're still recovering from excessive food and drink from the weekend. I found recipes on Recipezaar.com for both grilled romaine and a Caesar dressing for which I had all the ingredients. I'm excited for dinner tonight!

Grilled Caesar Salad
Recipe #3624450
1 romaine lettuce hearts, sliced in half with stem still attached
1 teaspoon olive oil
2 teaspoons lemon juice
salt and pepper
2-4 tablespoons prepared caesar salad dressing
1/4 cup crouton
anchovy (optional)
fresh shaved parmesan cheese, to taste (optional)
1/2 lb grilled chicken breast, well seasoned (optional)

Preheat grill to medium high. Drizzle oil and lemon juice over romaine and season with salt and pepper. Place on grill and cook for 1-2 minutes per side. Place cooked romaine on 2 plates and drizzle with dressing top with anchovies, cheese and or croutons. Enjoy!


Low Sodium Caesar Dressing
Recipe #98907

1/2 cup olive oil
4 cloves roasted garlic
1 tablespoon lemon juice
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
1/2 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce

Blend all ingredients. Shake or stir before serving.

*****

I don't think I'm going to roast just four cloves of garlic, so I'll just use regular garlic. I don't have eggs or mayonnaise on hand right now, so I had to filter those out of my search results because a lot of the recipes called for those. I'm excited to try both this dressing and the grilled salad. I will grill a chicken breast or two as well to throw on top of the salad.

*****

The husband and I were both pretty skeptical of how this was going to turn out and had a frozen pizza in mind as our back-up plan. We were both really surprised--this was FANTASTIC!!! He was probably a little more worried about it than me because I don't think he'd ever heard of grilling lettuce before, but the flavor of the lettuce after it was on the grill was really tasty. And this was super fast and easy to put together; the longest part was grilling the chicken! This is definitely something I will make again. It was a great summer dinner, too, as it was really light!

Orzo and Feta

I was looking through a cookbook recently that my mother-in-law gave me for Christmas, and I saw this recipe. The ingredients are all things I normally have on hand, so I've been waiting for the right main dish to serve this alongside. I thought falafel tonight would work well. Nice light dinner, nice light side dish. Perfect for an insanely hot day like we're having here in Phoenix.

Orzo and Feta

1/2 pound orzo, cooked according to package directions
1/2 cup green onions, finely chopped
1/2 cup crumbled feta
1/3 cup olive oil
3 Tbsp lemon juice
1/4 tsp dill weed (or 1 Tbsp fresh)
1/4 tsp oregano
Salt and pepper to taste

Combine all ingredients and serve at room temperature.

*****

I love easy, and this dinner tonight definitely fits the bill. I just need to get the falafel out of the freezer (I bought them ready-made at Costco awhile back), slice up a tomato or two, tear up some lettuce, and call it good. Oh, I'm using naan bread instead of pitas for the sandwiches tonight. Pitas just cause me too much grief, and I found the naan worked quite well last time. Once all that is defrosted and heated, I'll spread some hummus on the naan, top with falafel, tomato, and lettuce, and call it good.

*****

This was a fantastic side dish! I kept taking bites straight out of the bowl after I mixed it all together. It was really light and flavorful--a perfect summer dinner accompaniment. This will definitely be added into regular rotation!

Grilled Lemon Parsley Chicken Breasts

The stomach bug the boy and I had on Thursday came back to get us on Saturday. Yuck. Thankfully now I think it's all gone. We were feeling mostly better on Sunday, but I still wanted our tummies to take it easy, so I figured some kind of grilled chicken was a safe bet. On Saturday we went as a family to Barnes & Noble, and while we were there I decided to buy the same Cook's Illustrated that Jen B. had bought when we were at Sprouts together. It's actually a special summer grilling issue. There's a lot of stuff in it I'm excited to try, but I had everything on hand for this and thought it sounded nice and mild and easy.

Grilled Lemon Parsley Chicken Breasts
From Cook's Illustrated Summer Grilling

1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
6 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon minced fresh parsley leaves
1 1/4 teaspoons sugar
table salt
fresh ground black pepper
3 medium garlic cloves, minced
2 tablespoons water
4 (8 ounce) boneless skinless chicken breasts

1. Whisk together mustard, 1 tbsp lemon juice, 3 tablespoons olive oil, parsley, 1/4 teaspoons sugar, 1/4 teaspoons salt, and 1/4 teaspoons pepper in small bowl; set aside.
2. Whisk together remaining tablespoon lemon juice, remainin 3 tablespoons olive oil, remaining teaspoons of sugar, 1 1/2 teaspoons salt, 1/2 tsp pepper, garlic, and water in medium bowl. Place marinade and chicken in gallon-size zipper-lock bag and toss to coat; press out as much air as possible and seal bag. Refrigerate 30 minutes, flipping bag after 15 minutes.
3. Light large chimney starter filled with charcoal (6 qts, about 100 briquets) and allow to burn until coal are fully ignited andpartially covered with thin layer of ash, about 20 minutes. Build modified 2 leverl fire by arranging all coals over half of grill, leaving the other half empty. Position cooking grate over coals, cover grill, and heat grate until hot, about 5 minutes; scrape grate clean. Dip wad of paper towels in oil, holding wad with tongs, wipe cooking grate. Grill is ready when you can hold your hand 5" above grate for 5 minutes.
4. Remove chicken from bag, allowing excess marinade to drip off. Place chicken on cooler side of grill, smooth-side down, with thicker side facin coals. Cover with disposable 9x13" aluminum pan and cook until bottom of chicken just begins to develop light rill marks and is no longer translucent, 6-9 minutes. Using tongs, flip chicken and rotate so that thinner side faces coals. Cover with disposable pan and continue to cook until chicken is opaque and firm to touch and instant read thermometer inserted into thickest part of chicken registers 140 degrees, 6-9 minutes longer.
5. Move chicken to hotter side of grill and cook,uncovered, until dark grill marks appear, 1-2 minutes. Using tongs, flip chicken and cook until dark grill marks appear and instant read thermometer inserted into thickest part of chicken registers 160 degrees, 1-2 minutes linger. Transfer chicken to cutting board, let rest, tented with foil, 5 minutes. Slice each breast on bias into 1/4" thick slices and transfer to individual plates.
6. Drizzle with reserved sauce to serve.
7. On gas grill: Turn all burners to high and heat with lid down until very hot, about 15 minutes. Scrape grill grate with grill brush to clean. Dip wad of paper towels in oil; holding wad with tongs, wipe cooking grate. Leave primary burner turned to high and turn off other burners. Proceed with recipe, grilling with lid down and omitting disposable pan. Increase browning time by 1-2 minutes.

*****

I don't think I remembered to take a picture. I REALLY liked this chicken. The marinade was simple and easy, and the chicken was really flavorful. We have a gas grill, so I followed those instructions. I will definitely make this again--especially since most of the ingredients are things I always have on hand, and it has a pretty short marinating time...which is good since I'm pretty forgetful. ;)

Saito Chicken

I had originally planned something different for Sunday's dinner, a crockpot chicken marsala recipe. But, I was out running errands yesterday afternoon and thought that didn't really sound good at all. I wanted to grill. Memorial Day weekend and 4th of July weekend I just feel the need to grill. So I scrapped the plan for the crockpot dinner and decided to make this chicken again. I wasn't sure what sides to have with it, but I found a grilled potato recipe on RecipeZaar.com that sounded good, and I figured some peas and a salad would round out everything. I'll do the potatoes in a separate post.

Saito Chicken