Winner Winner Chicken Lunch

I couldn't think of a clever preamble to this recipe. I considered referencing Food, Inc. and the terror of chickens it instilled in me. Then, I considered a reference to the amazing Jacques Pépin, his apparent love of chicken, and the recently released Jacques Pépin: The Art of Craft from the American Masters series.But, you know what? This is simple food. Let's give it a simple post. Fuck it.

Pan-Fried Chicken Thigh on Mushrooms à la Crème

Ingredients

• 1 chicken thigh, skin and bone intact
• 1 cup white mushrooms, cleaned and sliced
• 1 Tbsp., crème fraîche
• 1 tsp., freshly squeezed lemon juice
• 1 tsp., fresh thyme leaves
• .5 tsp., fresh lemon zest
• salt and pepper to taste

Instructions

1. Preheat your oven to 175 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. Prepare your chicken thigh. Place the thigh, skin-side down on a cutting surface. With a knife, cut slits along either side of the thigh bone. This will help the meat cook more evenly/quickly by exposing more of its surface to heat.
3. Season the thigh on both sides with salt and pepper.
4. Place the thigh skin-side down in an unheated nonstick pan, then turn the heat to high. Do not add heat until the meat is in the pan!
5. When you hear the thigh begin to sizzle, reduce the heat to medium, cover the pan, and continue cooking for about 15-18 minutes.
6. Check your meat. Make sure it's not sticking to the pan. If the skin's browning too quickly, reduce the heat to low, recover, and continue to cook.
7. Once cooked, transfer the chicken to a heat-safe dish and pop it into your preheated oven to keep warm while you cook the mushrooms.
8. On the stove, turn the heat up to high and add mushrooms to the pan, sautéeing in the rendered chicken fat. Season with salt and pepper.
9. Once mushrooms are tender, stir in crème fraîche, lemon juice, and lemon zest until mushrooms are well coated and the mixture is heated through.
10. Before plating, sprinkle mushrooms with some fresh thyme and top with your chicken thigh.
11. Nom away!

Nutritional Info

Pan-Fried Chicken Thigh (about 4oz):

• Calories: 260
• Fat: 16g
• Protein: 28g
• Carbs: 0g
• Dietary Fiber: 0g

Mushrooms à la Crème:

• Calories: 185
• Fat: 18g
• Protein: 2g
• Carbs: 4g
• Dietary Fiber: 1g

Notes

• How can you tell the chicken is cooked? If you have a meat thermometer, look for an internal temperature of 165°F. Otherwise, you can generally tell that the meat is cooked when its juices run clear, rather than red (tinged with blood).
• You can definitely cook more than one chicken thigh at once. I'm just using the one here because 1) my fiancé is a vegetarian and particularly hates even the smell of chicken and 2) the best part about this dish is the crispy skin! I prefer to cook only what I'll eat immediately, so the skin remains crisp, as opposed to soggy after storing and reheating.
• Our friend Deb just suggested using a metal colander to cover the chicken while it's cooking on the stove. This will allow some of the moisture to dissipate, preventing soggy skin!

Ooh, how about some pics?

Enjoy!

Keto Baking is Hard

Despite all the benefits this keto lifestyle has provided, goddammit do I miss baked goods.So, this weekend, I tried my hand at two different baked goods – one savory, one sweet. The verdict? Maybe keto baking isn't for me. :(Still, I took some pictures and thought I'd share my failure all the same.First up, a savory coconut flour biscuit based loosely off this recipe. Rather than garlic and cheese, I went with sage, hazelnuts, and duck fat – I replaced half the butter called for with an equal amount of duck fat (about 2 Tbsp.) It went a little something like this:

VERDICT: Ehhh...  Everything smelled incredible, but the cookies themselves were dry and gritty. Again, I think I messed up with the amount of flour, so that's on me. Both the cookies and the spread had a noticeable tang of sugar substitute (I used Stevia in the Raw.) Perhaps I'm just too new to keto to appreciate a good sugar substitute (I still remember what real sugar tastes like), or I'm just using the wrong ones.While this weekend's experiments in keto baking were certainly fun and educational, I feel the overwhelming lesson was that keto baking is hard and I suck at it. I have a lot of learning left to do. 

Brocc-iflower Soup. Get hype.

You ever buy a bunch of vegetables thinking: "Oh, man. I'm going to eat so healthy! Vegetables are amazing and I am a person who eats them!" and then a week later you still have mounds of untouched broccoli and cauliflower in your fridge?Well, here's a soup you can make with that untouched broccoli and cauliflower. Hell, you might even go to the store and just pick some up – this nonsense is pretty fucking tasty. (Though all the heavy cream may have something to do with it, but, whatever: #ketolife, ya'll.)Here's what you'll need and how to put it all together...

Ingredients

NOTE: I'm separating the ingredients into two parts: the first part for what I consider to be the "prepping" stage, the second for what I'll call the "souping" stage.PART ONE: PREPPING

• 1 small head, raw cauliflower – about 7 oz., cleaned and separated into florets (chopped stems are tasty, too!)
• 1 small head, raw broccoli – about 7oz., cleaned and separated into florets (again, I like to include chopped stems!)
• 6 Tbsp., crème fraîche
• 6 Tbsp., water or broth of your choosing
• 6 Tbsp, heavy whipping cream

PART TWO: SOUPING

• .75 cup., water or broth
• 11 Tbsp., heavy whipping cream
• 1 tsp., raw lemon juice
• salt and pepper to taste
• 1 tsp., olive oil as garnish for "marbling"

Instructions

NOTE: I was inspired by an old video to try my hand at "marbling" the soup. If you'd like to try it, too, keep your cauliflower and broccoli separate at all times. I'll add some tips/notes below to help with this.

1. Steam cauliflower and broccoli until soft. I did this in a steamer basket on the stove in two batches (one cauliflower, one broccoli.)
2. Pulse steamed vegetables in a food processor, just enough to even out the larger chunks. Your veggies will get plenty of pulsing as you add the liquids.
   • SEPARATE SOUPS: Pulse separately and remember to clean your food processor between batches to keep your colors clean.
3. Add "prepping" liquids to the food processor – crème fraîche, water/broth, and whipping cream – and pulse to incorporate. The mixture should not yet be "soupy" in consistency, but more like a paste. A delicious vegetable paste.
   • Feel free to use less of the liquid ingredients per your taste, but I recommend keeping equal parts crème fraîche to water/broth to cream. 
   • If you're keeping cauliflower and broccoli separate and processing in batches, halve the ingredients between the two batches.
4. Transfer mixture to saucepan and heat over medium-low heat.
   • SEPARATE SOUPS: Use separate saucepans!
5. Add "souping" liquids to saucepan, stirring to incorporate. Again, you can deviate from the numbers used above to get your preferred consistency, but equal parts of each works well.
   • SEPARATE SOUPS: Divide the souping liquids between the two soups!
6. Salt, pepper, stir to taste.
7. Add a squeeze of lemon juice for a little brightness.
   • SEPARATE SOUPS: Add lemon juice only to the broccoli soup.
8. If you find your soup a little too slack, continue to cook over medium-low heat until the soup has reduced down to your preferred consistency. Otherwise...
9. Plate and enjoy!

Instructions for "Marbling"

I pretty much winged it here. But, here's what I did:

1. Pour broccoli soup into bowl.
2. Pour cauliflower soup into the center of the bowl, forming a white circle within the green, like some kind of fancy soup barista.
3. Drag the thin end of a clean chopstick through the cauliflower soup and into the broccoli, forming a design.
4. Using a clean eyedropper (I know, this is getting super fussy) place several drops of olive oil throughout the cauliflower section of the soup.
5. Again, drag the clean chopstick through the soup, this time in the opposite direction.
6. Continue to fiddle until you get a design you like.

Here are two more attempts I made at fiddling with soup...[gallery ids="6974,6975" type="square" columns="2"]

Nutritional Info

This recipe provided about 6 half-cup servings. The following numbers are per serving:

• Calories: 207
• Fat: 21g
• Protein: 2g
• Carbohydrates: 5g
• Fiber: 1g

Be advised that all that marbling fussiness is entirely unnecessary. I just thought it was fun. Also, it was kinda neat to be able to dip a spoon in and taste the soups separately. You can totally make the soup completely integrated from the start. In fact, after taking a few pictures, I combined the soups into a single container to keep in the fridge. Over the next few days, I reheated the soup in a small saucepan and garnished with shaved parmesan cheese, chopped basil leaves, or shredded cheddar. Good times.I really just made this all up as I went along, but am super happy with the results. If you try it yourself, I'd love to hear from you!