Thanks to all of you, “A Jeanne in the Kitchen” has hit the 500+ mark of followers.  WHOOOOOOOO HOOOOOOOOO!!!!  I know, if you look at the numbers on my page, it says 923, but that includes all my Facebook connections too.  My WordPress connections just hit the 500+ mark, and counting.  This could not have been possible without all of you and all your support.  So a BIG, HUGE THANK YOU to all of you who follow me.  My one year blogoversary is coming up in just a few days too.  All I can say is WOW!!!!  So many good opportunities, connections, and creative ideas all in such a short period of time.  There are still tons of good food and recipes yet to come out Jeanne’s kitchen.  So let’s keep this party rockin’ and rollin’ and see what’s coming up next for ” A Jeanne in the Kitchen”.  I know there are many, many good things still yet to come.  There are actually a couple of big surprises in the works as we speak.  You’ll just have to be patient to find out what they are.  Stay tuned.  Don’t change that dial.  And again, a HUGE thank you to each and every one of you.  🙂

My husband has been out of town all weekend, and comes home late tonight.  So other than the soup and the cookies, I really have not been in the kitchen much these last few days.  My waistline has already expanded way more than what I am comfortable with, so there is no need to really cook up a storm when it is just me.

I can easily live off a few leftovers for a few days.  So rather than extra calories, I will tempt you with some freshly “baked” words to savor instead.  I am definitely a bread person, and could easily live on a delicious diet of nothing but bread and butter if I had to.  In fact, that would be my diet of choice.  Bread, after all, is the food of life.

Bread is always the warmest, kindest of words.  Write it always with a capital letter, like your own name.

~ Russian Cafe Sign ~

Why has our poetry eschewed the rapture and response of food? What hymns are sung and praises said for the home-made miracle of bread?

~ Louis Untermeyer ~

The peasants of Sicily, who have kept their own wheat and make their own natural brown bread, ah, it is amazing how fresh and sweet and clean their loaf seems, so perfumed, as home-made bread used all to be before the war.

~ D.H. Lawrence, from Sea & Sardinia ~

Man does not live by bread alone.

~ Moses ~

I am the bread of life.  Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.

~ Jesus, John 6:35, New International Version of the Bible~

On a cold, frigid day, there is nothing better than a hot bowl of soup to warm you up from the inside out.  But is it really soup?  Or could it be a stew or a chowder or even a bisque?  They are all related, but each has its own unique personality and characteristics.  Soups and and bisques are both French in origin, but are totally different from each other.  A soup, or soupe as it is known in French, is a mixture of either vegetables, legumes, meats or seafood, or any combination thereof, cooked in a liquid broth.  A bisque is a creamy soup, usually made with seafood and frequently has a tomato base.  They are pureed and smooth.  Chowders are American.  They are thick creamy, chunky soups, often made with potatoes and bacon.  The name chowder is a derivative of the French word chaudiere, which means cauldron, the name of the pots fisherman would use to cook their fish soups or stews.  But that is about as French as chowders come.  They originated in the Northeastern part of the United States, in the New England area.  The first written recipe for a chowder dates back to 1751.  Originally chowders were made with seafood, but today, any thick, creamy, chunky soup is considered to be a chowder.  Soups, bisques and chowders are all types of soup and are cooked with a lot of liquids.  Bisques and chowders are thickened, often with a roux or flour and usually have milk or cream added to them as well.  Stews are distant cousins of soups.  A stew is a dish consisting of a combination of meats, fish and or vegetables that is stewed or cooked slowly in a covered dish with very little liquid.  Whatever your preference, they all do the trick on those cold, cold days when the mercury drastically drops down and you need something to warm you up.

I like them all, but most often I prefer chowders.  I have made many, many types of chowders and soups throughout the years.  Sometime I follow (more or less) certain recipes and other times I throw in whatever I have leftover into the “soup pot” and cook it all up into something totally unique.   We are still in the throws of winter here in the Denver area, even though Spring is supposedly right around the corner.  Our high today, though not as cold as yesterday, was only about 18* F. But it us still pretty darn frigid.  It was a perfect day for soup, or chowder as it turned out.  I made a spicy chicken and wild rice chowder that definitely helped warm “the cockles of my heart” and took off the chill.

Spicy Chicken and Wild Rice Chowder

2-3 lbs chicken breasts, cubed small

4 celery stalks, diced small

4 large carrots, peeled and diced small

1 onion, diced small

1 large jalapeno, diced fine

2 TBSP garlic

6 large mushrooms, sliced

1 can diced tomatoes with juice

5 cans chicken broth or about 10 cups

2 1/2-3 cups wild rice

2 cups heavy whipping cream

salt, pepper and red pepper flakes to taste

1 TBSP oregano

2 tsp each thyme and marjoram

olive oil for cooking

Cook the chicken in one pan and the carrots, jalapeno, garlic, celery and onions in another pan, both in olive oil.  When the chicken is completely cooked, add it to the vegetables, along with the mushrooms, broth, tomatoes, rice and seasonings.  Mix everything together well..  Cover and bring to a rapid boil, then reduce the heat to a simmer and cook for another 45-60 minutes or until the rice is cooked.  If you want it just like this, without the cream, this is a perfectly delicious soup all on its own.

If you prefer it creamy like I do, then add the cream after the soup is cooked.  Mix thoroughly and continue to cook for at least another 30 minutes or so, stirring occasionally.

By adding the cream and cooking it some more, my soup has now become a chowder.

As a soup, you can serve it with your choice of wines, although I would recommend a dry white or a sweeter white to balance out the spiciness.  As a creamed chowder, I would definitely go with a white rather than a red, but as always, drink what you like.  There is no right or wrong and there are no absolutes you need to follow when pairing wines with foods.  Drink what you like and enjoy!

Winter has hit us very hard all throughout February, and now into March.  We have had a lot of snow and very cold, frigid temperatures lately.  I am looking out at a blanket of  snow, right now as I write.  This morning, when I went into work, the roads were a slushy, slippery mess and my car thermometer read 3* F.  BRRRRRR!  That was at 9:30 AM.  When I was coming home from work, the roads were a bit better, but the mercury had only risen 2*, making it 5* instead of 3*.  It was still frigid.  Then it started to snow yet again.  Now that I am home, I have no intentions of going out again today, unless it is absolutely necessary.  So being homebound, with no intentions of leaving again today, I thought it was a very good day to bake cookies.  By turning the oven on, it also helped to keep the house warmer too.

This is what it looks like outside.  The snow is still coming down, but not very hard.  My pond is frozen.

This is what it looked like inside.

My husband loves chocolate peanut butter cookies and has been asking for some for awhile now.  Today I decided to make them a bit differently though.  I made just plain cookies with the  Reese’s pieces, so very little chocolate, but a whole lot of peanut butter flavor.  Me, I just love cookies period.  It doesn’t really matter to me what kind I make; they are cookies after all, which means I am going to love them no matter what.  Yes, I certainly do have my favorites, but cookies in general always get a gold star in my book.

Peanut Butter Bites

These are just plain chocolate chip cookies but I used the Reese’s pieces instead of chocolate chips.

2 1/4 cups sifted flour

1 tsp salt

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 lb (2 sticks) softened butter

2 large eggs

3/4 cup sugar

3/4 cup brown sugar, packed firmly

1 tsp vanilla

2 – 2/4 cups Reese’s pieces, depending on how peanut buttery and chocolate you like them

Preheat the oven to 350* F.

Mix all the dry ingredients together and set aside.

Cream the butter and the sugars together, then add the eggs and vanilla and mix again.  Once all the soft ingredients are mixed together, add the flour, 1/2 batch at a time and mix in between each addition.  Then add the Reese’s pieces and fold in, combining thoroughly.

Once everything is thoroughly combined, drop about 1 TBSP of cookie dough onto an ungreased cookie sheet and continue until the dough is done.  I like flatter cookies, so i usually give them a light press with the palm of my hand before palcing them in the oven.  Bake for about 14-18 minutes, or until the cookies are lightly browned and the edges are slightly crisp.  if you like them softer, reduce the time slightly.  Cool for about 5-7 minutes, then place the cookies on a cookie rack to cool completely.  You might just have to sample a few before they get plated up though, for quality control purposes.

I know, this is not my normal blog about food and food related topics, but it is a bonus blog about my two kitties, Otis and Nicodemus instead.  We lovingly call them our puma and our panther.  Otis is our puma and Nicodemus is our little panther.  Otis and Nicodemus are litter mates.  They were originally Kansas farm kitties, coming from my sister-in-law’s farm.  They were the only two survivors when a dog got to their mother and all their other litter mates, killing them all instantly.  Once found, Otis and Nicodemus were hand-raised by my sister-in-law and her daughter-in-law, until we rescued them and brought them home with us.  We brought them back to Colorado when they were about six months old.  They are 3 1/2 now.  My husband and I name our four-legged children by looking at maps of where they (or their origins) come from.  Otis and Nicodemus are both towns in Kansas, and since our kitties are both Kansas kitties, we thought these names just suited them.  My husband wanted one, and I wanted the other one, so we compromised and took them both (although I really wanted both of them all along).  In reality, there was NO WAY we could have separated them, even then, especially after their traumatic beginning.  So today, they are fat and sassy, and getting fatter and sassier everyday.  No more farms for them.  Today, they enjoy the good life of being indoor-only kitties.  They are brother and sister, but they look and act nothing like siblings.  They are absolutely inseparable and sometimes often they act more like mates than brother and sister.  As you look at the pictures, you will instantly know we just had to keep them together.  They are like ying and yang.  You can’t have one without the other.

In the beginning.  This was their first day at their forever home with us.

My table toppers and plant eaters.

A new tree.

Tired Bronco fans.  It must have been an exciting game.

Stop with the pictures already Mom.

Sleepy time for the Bronco fans.

Watching kitty TV.

That look says it all – “Mom, stopping bothering us”.

Just playin’ around.

I love good seafood, and even though I am land-locked and live in the middle of the Rocky Mountains, we still get to enjoy quite a bit of seafood.  Of course it is frozen, and not fresh, but it is still very good.  We had not had cod in awhile, so when I saw that it was on sale, I just couldn’t resist, and had to get some.  Quite often when I cook cod, I make it as fried fish & chips, which we love.  You know, the Aussie in me just loves fish & chips.  But I thought I would cook it differently this time around.

The other day, when I went to Savory Spice,  Savory Spices of Denver they let me pick out a bag of spices for my birthday, since I went while it was still February, my birthday month.  I chose a a bag of seafood seasoning, knowing I had some cod waiting to be cooked up deliciously at home.   I mixed the seafood seasoning with pecans and dried, roasted garlic to use as my coating for the cod.  I love pecan crusted seafood, and often order it when we go out for a good seafood dinner.  Along with the pecan crusted cod that I topped with a roasted yellow pepper coulis, I served wild rice and Brussels sprouts mixed with apples, bacon and onions and warmed Naan bread.

Baked Pecan Crusted Cod

1 1/2 lbs cod

1 cup pecans

2 tsp Savory Spice Seafood Spice

1 tsp dried, roasted garlic

1 egg

dash of milk

Mix the pecans and spices in the food processor until the pecans are ground very fine.

Preheat the oven to 375* F.

Whisk the egg and milk together and pat the fish dry with a paper towel.  Dip the fish into the egg mixture and thoroughly coat it.  Then evenly coat the fish with the nut and spice mixture.  Spray a baking dish with cooking spray and place the fish into the pan.  Bake uncovered for about 35-40 minutes or until the fish is done and the pecans are toasted and crusty.  I am a “saucy” kind of girl, and I love sauces on just about everything, so I made an easy-peasy roasted yellow pepper coulis to top my fish.  Chicken Stuffed with Chorizo and Spinach

This dinner is very healthy and very low fat.  Neptune would have definitely approved of this tasty seafood delicacy.  I completed the meal with a crisp, flavorful Viogner, from another one of our local wineries, Bookcliff Vineyards, located in Boulder.

*** You can learn more about Bookcliff Vineyards by checking out their website at http://www.bookcliffvineyards.com.

I have said many times that LOVE is always the most important ingredient added to any dish or recipe.  However, it is by no means the only ingredient.  For anyone who cooks, we all know that there are simple recipes with only a few ingredients, as well as some complicated recipes that require a lot of ingredients, and often times, some of these are specialized items that are hard to find.  This does not have to be the case though.  Savory Spice is specialty spice shop that offers the finest spices from all over the world.  It is a locally owned and operated business that started right here in Denver, Colorado, by Mike and Janet Johnson, in 2004.  I was introduced to the Savory Spice world a little over a year ago by my friend Janet (a different Janet than the owner), and instantly fell in love with the store and its products.  Both Mike and Janet are avid home cooks and bakers who decided to open a specialty spice shop for fresh and unique spices to enhance their recipes. Today, there are four Savory Spice shops located throughout the Denver Metro area.  They offer 554 different products, and their products are currently used by over 1100 restaurants.  All of the “spices are ground fresh in small batches for superior quality and flavor” and can be purchased in jars or in small bags.  All of the jars are still hand-filled in either the Denver warehouse or in any one of the store locations.  If you have already purchased products from Savory Spice, keep the bottles and jars so they can be refilled.  You get a discount for doing so and you are helping the environment by recycling and re-using the jars as well.  It’s a win/win situation for everyone, plus you are using top-notch, quality spices and flavorings for your recipes.  It doesn’t get much better than  that.  You can learn more about Savory Spice by checking out their website http://www.savoryspiceshop.com/savory/spice‎.

Here are some of my recent Savory Spice purchases.  If I can, I love buying local and supporting small, family-owned businesses.

They even have recipe cards with fabulous recipes that highlight different spices and flavorings.

The term Florentine is used in French cooking to indicate a dish is served on top of or with a bed of spinach.  It has been used since the mid 1500’s, when Queen Catherine de Medicis, who was married to King Francois I of France, came to the thrown.  Queen Catherine was born in Florence, Italy.  She was suspicious of the French cooks, so she brought her own cooks from Florence to cook for her.  She had them cook a lot of her foods with spinach.  She also brought spinach seeds to plant with her as well.  Preparing foods with spinach became so popular in France, that the style of cooking with or adding spinach to a dish became known as the Florentine style of cooking.

It is believed that spinach originally came from Persia over 2000 years ago.  It then made its way to China around 647 BCE, but did not make it to the Mediterranean parts of Europe until the 9th century, when the Saracens invaded Italy.   In the 11th century, the Arabs brought spinach to Spain.  It did not make it to England and the rest of the European continent until around the mid 1500’s.  The word spinach is derived from the Persian word aspankh.  When spinach was introduced to the Europeans, there were many different spellings and names for the word spinach.  Some of these were spinech, spinage, spinnage and spynoches.  Today, we Americans refer to it as spinach.

I love spinach and cook in the Florentine style quite often.  Usually I add mushrooms, garlic, onions or shallots and tomatoes as well, and that is exactly how I cooked my chicken a la Florentine.  I served it over a bed of red lentils mixed with barley (I had some leftover barley that I mixed with the lentils to give it more texture), some warm bread with my olive oil and balsamic vinegar dipping sauce and a nice crisp chardonnay to complete the meal.  It was simply rustic and simply delicious.  You can also serve it over pasta or rice.  You can also serve the Florentine topping with fish or pork too or tofu if you want to make it vegetarian or vegan.

I marinated the chicken breasts in Italian dressing for about 4-5 hours, to make it nice and flavorful and tender.  Any kind of Italian dressing will do.

Chicken a la Florentine

1 1/2-2 lbs of chicken breasts, marinated in Italian dressing

2-3 cups fresh spinach, stems removed, chopped rough

5-6 mushrooms, sliced

1 large shallot, sliced thin

1/2- 3/4 cup of tomatoes, small dice

olive oil

salt & pepper to taste

Saute the spinach, garlic, mushrooms and shallots together in olive oil and add the salt & pepper to your likings.  Cook for bout 5-7 minutes, or until the spinach is soft and all the vegetables are completely cooked.  Add the tomatoes right at the very end and mix thoroughly into the vegetable mixture.  Serve atop the chicken.  You can also serve this over fish or pork or tofu too.