Cooking for Alan – Dinner #8 Sunday Supper
As everyone knows by now I’m a huge Ina Garten (Barefoot Contessa) fan. I’ve also set a goal to prepare all of the dishes she has in her “Cooking for Jeffrey” cookbook and blog about my experience. However the dishes I prepared tonight are mostly Ina’s, but the inspiration came from some of her recent Facebook posts, rather than her cookbook.
I was aiming for a simply Sunday Supper that included some dishes that represent “summertime comfort”. Our friends had just arrived from their other home in Colorado and were gracious enough to add to the meal. Steve and Cindy brought along a bottle of delicious Italian Pinot Grigio, some corn muffin biscuits and an Angel Food cake topped with fresh strawberries and whipped cream. All together it was a perfect, simple Sunday Supper.
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Orzo with Roasted Vegetables and Feta
Fresh Sweet Corn
Corn Muffin Biscuits
Angel Food Cake with Fresh Strawberries and Cream
Orzo Salad with Roasted Vegetables
Nearly all of the vegetables,herbs and cheese came from either my garden or the farmers market. I substituted zucchini for the eggplant listed in the recipe. I also substituted garlic scapes for the regular garlic cloves. Garlic scapes are a lovely, mild form of garlic and are only available at my farmers market a few weeks out of the year…so I’m basically putting them in everything! It is super important to add the dressing to the orzo as soon as you drain the water off. This way the pasta soaks all of the lemony goodness in to each little piece. This would make a perfect lunch dish all on it’s own and would work well for my vegetarian friends.
Buttermilk Fried Chicken
If you’re going to the trouble to make fried chicken, then you may as well prepare two chickens. Who doesn’t love leftover fried chicken? Hot or Cold. The absolute key to this scrumptious, juicy and flavorful chicken is soaking it overnight in buttermilk. The only modification to Ina’s original recipe was that I added about 1 tablespoon of paprika to the flour mixture. I had seen one of Ina’s shows on fried chicken with her guest chef, Tyler Florence. He added the paprika to the coating…so I figured why not. I suppose if you wanted spicy chicken you could easily add hot paprika, smoked paprika or cayenne pepper. The other thing I love about this process is that you only fry the chicken for 3 minutes per side…just to set the crispy coating. You then put it on a sheet tray, fitted with a mesh cooking rack and finish it in the oven. In my opinion this is an excellent technique when you’re having a dinner party. All the frying gets out of the way, then you can pop them in the oven to finish the cooking. Then turn off the heat and hold them there until you’re ready to serve. I’m pretty sure this is the only way I’ll prepare fried chicken again. I hope my Tennessee and Kentucky ancestors would be proud.
