Week 4: Curried Coconut Chicken

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Curried-Coconut-Chicken/Detail.aspx?evt19=1

We love going to Bombay House here in Provo and I thought I would try out some Indian food, although it seemed kind of intimidating, to be honest.

We spend a little extra on an Indian curry at the grocery store, since Luisa is a little picky when it comes to curry (it's hard to find good curry here compared to the curry in Germany). Inspired by the coconut curry at Bombay House, we also grabbed some golden raisins and some unsalted cashews to add to it.

Following some of the reviews, I made a couple edits to the recipe. I started by cooking the curry powder in some oil for a couple minutes, then adding the onions and the spices. After the onions are glassy, add some fresh tomatoes instead of stewed tomatoes later. Then added the chicken and followed the recipe the rest of the way, adding the raisins and cashews about 10 minutes before it's done. It took a long time to reduce but it worked out really well.

Ate it with black rice from Costco (the black rice is amazing).

Josh's Rating: 4.8/5

          This tasted absolutely amazing! Definitely the best food I have ever cooked. Next time I will leave out just a little bit of sugar but otherwise I wouldn't change a thing. It had just the perfect amount of spiciness for me and the raisins and cashews were a great addition.

Luisa's Rating: 4.9/5

          It was delicious. I love the sweet and the spicy. It was just plain good.

Week 3: Parmesan-Crusted Tilapia

http://www.rachaelraymag.com/recipes/rachael-ray-magazine-recipe-search/five-ingredient-recipes/parmesan-crusted-tilapia

We really like fish and tilapia is a pretty easy fish to cook. The only thing is that it definitely needs some good seasoning.

I added a little bit to the recipe and the changes worked out really nicely. I chopped some garlic and sauteed it in the oil before pouring the oil over the fish. Also, following some of the reviews on the recipe, I added some lemon pepper and basil to the parmesan mix. I also made sure that there was enough parmesan to completely coat each side of the fish. At the end of baking, I also broiled the fish for about 4 minutes.

Note to self: Always make sure fish is completely thawed before cooking. The first time I tried this the fish was almost raw in the middle and we had to microwave it before really eating it...embarrassing. But the second time it turned out perfect!

Ate it with a side of broccoli and cauliflower.

Josh's Rating: 4.5/5

          This tasted amazing! There was a lot of flavor and the fish (the second time) was perfectly done. Definitely adding to the list of fall back recipes.

Luisa's Rating: 4/5

          Luisa would have liked to have it a little longer under the broiler so the crust would be a little crispier. But the contrast of the soft fish and the crust was great. Would have maybe been good to have some sort of sauce, but it did have a lot of great flavor.

Week 2: Chicken Thighs with Orange Sauce

http://southernfood.about.com/od/bakedchicken/r/r100226a.htm

I had tried making orange chicken toward the beginning of our marriage and it didn't turn out well at all. But I thought I would just give it another try with this recipe.

We always just buy a big bag of Costco chicken tenderloins, so most of the recipes I try will use those instead. This ended up working out pretty well, but only needed about 10 minutes to bake. Had a side of rice and green and yellow beans.

Josh's Rating: 3.5/5

          The big problem with this recipe is that it was extremely sweet because of the orange juice concentrate. Next time I will use less brown sugar and see if I can find a good substitute for the orange juice concentrate. It definitely tasted a lot better than the last time we tried orange chicken, though.

Luisa's Rating: 3.5/5

          It was good, but it was too sweet. Maybe changing it up a bit, using less sugar would help.

Week 1: Slow-Cooker Creamy Herbed Chicken Stew

http://www.bettycrocker.com/recipes/slow-cooker-creamy-herbed-chicken-stew-cooking-for-2/09b16f5f-43e0-4589-9c1e-b896dee5cf79

When we flew to my family's for Christmas, I had to come home a week earlier than Luisa because I had to go back to work. I wanted her to be able to come home to a clean apartment and have dinner ready, since it would already be fairly late and I knew that it would be stressful flying with Jonah. Since I was picking everyone up from the airport, I thought it would be good to find a crockpot meal that could continue cooking while I was driving.

This looked delicious and fairly easy, so I decided to give it a try as new recipe #1.

In the end I basically followed the recipe, but instead of chicken thighs I just used pieces of chicken breast, and I substituted frozen peas for the pea pods.

Josh's Rating: 4/5

          I thought it tasted really good but it felt like something was missing. Definitely worth making again, though.

Luisa's Rating: 3/5

          Luisa liked the stew for the most part but she doesn't really like cream, so this kind of sauce wasn't really her thing. Since you don't have to add the sauce until the end, I'll just not add any of the creamy sauce to hers.