I had a long week. The first half sucked. The second did not. I received two comments from two of my dear friends that gave me some good ideas. Mike's comment about the marinade gave me some good ideas and another of my friends told me to cook with the sauce as well.
I thought to myself that I should try cooking in some wine. I bought two cheap bottles of wine; one red and one white. I got back from buying the food and I was all set to uncork one when I realized that I had absolutely no clue where my corkscrew was. I'd not brought it out the entire time I was in Korea. I hunted for it to no success. I'm sticking to teriyaki sauce tonight then. But I figure I'll try the wines out when I buy a corkscrew tomorrow. I'll marinade one in red and one in white. In the white, I'll probably add some lemon peel that I bought (I plan on buying two small bottle of spices every week I go to the commissary to build a collection cheaply).
I'll keep experimenting and writing down what works. I also bought some liquor- bourbon and gin. In addition to the wine, I'll try cooking some in those and see what happens (me thinks it will turn out terribly). There was some champagne in the shoppette and I thought, wouldn't that be interesting to have?
I'd like to take my friend's Mike's suggestion to put the chicken in a ziplocked bag for the week in the fridge to defrost it but my other friend, Mike (the LT here with me) said he doesn't trust chicken b/c of salmonella and he'd recommend doing it only for a day. Which beckons the question- how safely can I keep chicken? The last thing I want to have happen is get sick violently and miss a lot of work (its a sad thing to see that its not the getting violently sick I fear but rather the missed work)(what has the Army wrought?)
Also, a writer's note: I'm going to try avoiding using the Internet for a while so I can simply experiment on my own. I have Joy of Cooking but I think I'm just going to try to teach myself how to cook with some helpful suggestions from my friends. Of course the point of this blog is to document those successes and failures.
The End.
Don't know if cooking with gin is such a great idea...I've never even heard of anything cooked in gin.
ReplyDeleteOk so I'm way behind reading these. Actually this is my second time reading this one, but I didn't have time to post before.
ReplyDeleteI usually stick to white wine with white meat and red wine with red meat. I love sauces/juices made with white wine - they set chicken off really well. I'd save the gin to mix with tonic water and the champagne for mimosas. Bourbon might work - honey bourbon chicken?
As for chicken, I usually try not to keep it in the fridge more than 1-2 days before freezing or cooking. I, too, am suspicious of chicken. Also, make sure you cook it all the way through - I tip my uncle told me one time is that chicken that's done should be firm like the area between your thumb and pointer finger when you're making a fist. It makes more sents to show it than explain it...but maybe it makes sense to you :)