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Diversity In Food – A Child from the marriage of Chicken Soup and Chicken Stew!

Friday, March 5th, 2021

This dish was an accident, but one I am delighted happened because it improves on both chicken soup and chicken stew.

The first time I made this I didn’t know what happened. I was trying for chicken soup, but the result was definitely not what I thought it would be nor was it the chicken soup to which I was accustomed..

When I repeated the process, it became clear that I had discovered something rare and absolutely delicious.

A whole chicken is needed – preferably one of good size rather than the small young chickens that are good for frying. Decades ago these were called “stewing hens”. Today they seem to have disappeared in favor of the young chickens usually much under three pounds. The life span of, chickens has seriously diminished, they no longer have a long life.

If you can’t find a large one, then whatever you find will still make a good dish. ONLY make sure the chicken is organically grown. That is what really makes the difference. And everything else you use for this dish must be organic – otherwise, why bother cooking. It would only limit your life span.

First – take as much of the skin off the chicken as possible. This makes a better dish and the skin must be saved because it makes an absolutely scrumptious snack. – Recipe for this to follow in another article.

Second – put three or more tablespoons of organic butter into a very large pot and add chopped onions, celery, carrots and garlic. Add the garlic after the onions, and other vegetables have had a few minutes in the pot alone.

Use very generous amounts of the vegetables. – all of which have been organically grown.

Add the chicken and let these ingredients fry together for several minutes turning the chicken so it doesn’t burn or get too brown.

Add a can of organic coconut milk to the pot – please don’t use the “light” kind. Regular organic coconut milk is what makes the best dish. The other shouldn’t even be on the grocery store shelves.

Add several spices. The ones we like for this dish are salt, tabasco sauce, thyme, turmeric and rosemary. One person who tested this recipe added honey – YUK!! But he waxed eloquent about the results. That is what happens when you let men into the kitchen. The dish is adulterated, although he brought a pot for us to sample and it was quite good. Not excellent, but very good.

Let the dish cook a bit until everything in the pot looks comfortable combined together..

Add regular milk to cover everything to about two inches above.

Add noodles – uncooked. We prefer the large very thick noodles for this dish. They are what takes the dish from ordinary to great. If you lose your confidence in our recipes and add cooked noodles you will have a very disappointing dish. Something is added to this dish when the noodles so added are uncooked and allowed to cook to perfection in this dish rather than being put into the dish after boiling everything decent out of the noodles in a separate pot full of water and salt.

Let simmer until the chicken is done – at least 45 minutes – stirring every ten to fifteen minutes to keep all of the flavors moving around one another.

Add the zest from one lemon – obtained by using a rasp which takes only the yellow part off the uncut lemon, then squeeze the lemon juice into the pot. If a couple seeds get into the pot also, no problem, they add to the taste and nutrition of the dish.

The mixture will thicken without adding either corn starch or flour. Just give it time. And enjoy!!!

Serve in soup bowls – however, take care that the consistency is not as liquid as a soup and not as lacking in liquid as a stew.

AND feel free to send us your feedback on this dish. NOT on what you think about it, but what your experience having made it has told you.

Interesting and very nutritious Recipes to rev up your immune system!

Monday, October 19th, 2020

Try this hamburger with kale chips – you won’t believe how good it is.

First, the kale chips.

Take the “spine” out of the Kale. Just rip the leaves away from the middle tough spine and put the leaves on a baking sheet.

Pour a very little melted butter or peanut oil or olive oil (only use olive oil if you don’t have any of the others) If you use olive oil you will have to bake these kale leaves at 200 degrees Fahrenheit or 250 tops. Olive Oil goes rancid quickly if used with too high heat. Rancid oil does not help your immune system become healthier and in great shape. In fact, it does exactly the opposite.

We love very good Olive Oil on salads and other things not cooked. Keep my Olive Oil away from the stove.

Sprinkle himalayan salt (that beautiful pink salt), Old Bay Seasoning, maybe a little thyme, turmeric and sage over the kale leaves.

Mix with your hands turning the leaves over and over until they are all evenly coated with the oil and seasonings.

If you have other seasonings you like, don’t hesitate to use them instead of what we suggested. That comes from our taste. You probably have a culturally acquired taste for specific seasonings – by all means use them. You will find the kale chips much more to your liking if you do.

We have tried this with butter and with peanut oil. We prefer the peanut oil, but you probably will have to go to China Town to get it. Most groceries don’t carry peanut oil anymore or they carry a really inferior brand.

Put the baking sheet in the oven at 300 or 350 degrees Fahrenheit and bake them until they are very crisp. Check them periodically – ours take about an hour sometimes an hour and a half to cook.

To assemble the hamburger:

Put a hamburger bun in the oven to heat. Make sure you are using an organic hamburger bun. That means only organic flour and preferably made with whole wheat flour.

Once heated, spread things you like on the bun – mayonnaise, mustard, organic bread and butter pickles, etc. Make sure everything is organic, don’t ruin it at this point.

Use ground beef which is organic from grass fed beef and shape into patties.

Fry them in a cast iron skillet – briefly and on medium heat. You can oil the pan, however if you use 85-15% meat to fat you don’t need to oil the pan. And, if you keep your cast iron skillets well oiled you really don’t need to ever oil the pan – they are non-stick in that instance.

Put the cooked ground beef pattie on the hamburger bun. Top it with a slice or slices of tomato. Put the kale chips on top of the tomato and close the bun.

The kale chips take this way upscale. We used to like lettuce with the tomatoes on the hamburger bun, however this has more nutrition and adds dramatically to the taste.

We use mayonnaise on these buns because that lets the taste of everything else come through. Mustard could be too strong a taste, but if you are one of those people who needs your mustard – go ahead.

Enjoy! And feel this great nutritional dish surge through your system running out everything that does not belong and that will cause you “ill” feelings.

DO NOT USE store bought kale chips no matter how tempting and make sure you are using organically grown kale. It takes less than five minutes to prepare the kale for the oven and you will have leftovers to use as we suggest below.

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Once you have enjoyed this hamburger you will be more ready to follow our next suggestion. We keep kale chips and bake them fresh every week to use as seasoning in many dishes. Sometimes we use kale chips instead of salt in different dishes. Other times we find the taste is great with rice. Just about any dish is improved if you sprinkle a bit of kale chips in the dish.

Not only will the dish be improved, its nutritional value will also be stepped up and your body will benefit.

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