Recipes Collection

Chicken croquettes are such an old fashioned dish. I dont know why I had such a hankering for them recently, but I did. Its not like anyone in my family ever made them, but the idea of chicken encased in a creamy sauce and then cooked until crisp on the outside is very appealing and was calling my name there for a while. I guess they havent really disappeared from modern eating either; theyve just been displaced by the chicken "nugget". No comparison though. None at all.

Its really best to use leftover cooked chicken for these. Its an awful lot of work to cook it just so you can make them. But if you do have some, these are a food plan. 

8 - 12 croquettes; 4 to 6 servings
30 minutes cooking time in advance, not including cooking the chicken
1 hour to finish; 20 minutes prep time, not including the chilling


2 cups chopped cooked chicken
1 cup bread crumbs
2 large shallots
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons soft unbleached flour

1 recipe poultry seasoning
1 cup whole milk or light cream
1 extra-large egg

2 tablespoons mild vegetable oil or melted butter
1 cup bread crumbs
2 extra-large eggs

Chop the chicken with the bread crumbs. Its best to put them through a food processor, but do retain some texture.

Peel and mince the shallots. Put them in a large pot with the butter and salt, and cook gently until soft and slightly browned. Add the flour and cook for a few minutes more, stirring frequently, until well amalgamated and even a little browned. Mix in the poultry seasoning. Stir in the milk or cream, a little at a time, to make a smooth paste, working out any lumps before adding more. Once it is all in, continue cooking, stirring frequently, until thickened. Mix the chicken and bread crumbs into the sauce. Cover and refrigerate until cold and fairly firm in texture.

To make the croquettes, preheat the oven to 350°F. Brush a large lasagne pan with some of the oil or melted butter. Pu the bread crumbs in a shallow dish, and the eggs, beaten, in another. Divide the mixture into the number of croquettes desired. Roll each one in the crumbs, then the eggs, then the crumbs again. Do not attempt to flatten them into a patty shape until they are placed in the baking dish, at which point they should be gently pressed to be about 1" thick. This is because the mixture remains fairly soft even when chilled, and is easier to work with as a ball.

When all the patties are thus formed, brush them with the remaining oil or butter. Bake at 350°F for 35 to 40 minutes,  until firm and golden-brown.




Last year at this time I made Smoked Trout & Sweet Potato Cakes.

I love breakfast foods! When I got to a diner Im always torn between ordering breakfast or lunch. I love french onion soup but give me some french toast and a poached egg and Im so happy. It all depends on what everyone else is ordering though. If I am sitting there enjoying my soup and then I get a whiff of bacon and eggs...deep regret. Im just so indecisive when it comes to this!

Last year Steve and I got a few couples together to go apple picking. Everyone met at our place first for breakfast. That was so much fun for me! I experimented with baked french toast and it was a huge hit! So last weekend when my childhood friend stayed over with her Fiance there was a request for a repeat of this dish. I was happy to make it again but the only problem was that I combined a few different recipes and never wrote down what I did. That was before I started this lovely little blog that forces me to write down recipes! I did find some notes scribbled onto one paper but not enough information was there. Now that I made it again I think I left out a step. Oops. I didnt bake the french toast again with the topping which is what I think I was supposed to do. I didnt have the topping in the oven at all. Im pretty sure thats wrong now that I think about it. I also feel like 3 cups of milk is a lot. I will try it next time with a little less because it seemed a little wet in the middle and it was cooking at 425 and got nice and browned on top. I think in the future I will cook it for about an hour at 350.

The taste was great! I dont think it was missing anything at all! I would absolutely make this again and now that I have this written down I will be able to perfect it. Wish me Luck!


Ingredients:

French Toast:

1 loaf Challah Bread, cut into 1 inch slices
3 cups whole milk
3 eggs, beaten
3 tbsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp almond extract
1 tsp nutmeg
2 tsp cinnamon

Topping:

1/2 cup butter, melted
2 tbsp dark corn syrup or maple syrup
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup chopped pecans or walnuts


Directions:

1. In a baking dish layer slices of bread so that they are touching and rip a slice of bread into pieces to fill in any holes. Make two layers.

2. In a bowl combine eggs, milk, sugar, extracts, nutmeg and cinnamon. Pour this mixture over bread. Wrap with plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight.

3. Next morning, preheat oven to 350. Meanwhile, in a small saucepan melt butter and take off the heat. Add corn syrup/maple syrup, brown sugar and nuts. Stir to combine and it will make a paste.

4. Spread mixture over bread that soaked up eggs and milk.

Bake for approximately 1 hour or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.


Like I said above, I did this wrong. I baked it before I put the topping on. This is what it looked like puffed up and golden.



Heres the topping!

Baked Tortilla Chips

Ingredients
All purpose flour / Maida flour- 1 cup
Cooking soda - 1/4 tsp
Butter or Olive Oil or Lard- 2 tbsp
Hot water- 1/2 cup
Salt to taste

Tortilla Chips with Salsa

Method
1. In a large bowl combine flour, cooking soda, required salt and butter, mix well with your fingers until it resembles bread crumbs.
2. Add hot water to the flour little by little and knead flour for 10 mins until a smooth and soft dough is formed.
3. Set aside the tortilla dough for 5 mins. Take a lemon sized dough and roll out into thin and even circle. Prick flattened dough with fork and cut into several triangle shapes.
4. Pre - heat oven to 200c, place the triangle shaped dough pieces on a oven proof cookie sheet or tray leaving some spaces between each dough.
5. Bake until tortilla chips are crisp and golden browned.
6. Place the chips on wire rack allow to cool and store it in air tight container.
Serve with Mexican Salsa----> click for the salsa recipe