This is a rip-off of a Martha Stewart recipe and it’s the only reason I keep around this particular ragged copy of Everyday Food. It’s fail safe — one of those meals you can fancy up or dress down. We just had it tonight and I’d forgotten how good it is. You ready? Here it goes:
- Get yourself a rotisserie chicken. Sure you could roast your own chicken but this is supposed to be easy; why make it hard? I am a little grossed out by most rotisserie chickens but the Costco ones are great and they’re huge and they’re only five bucks. That’s the same price as the scrawny Kroger ones.
- Saute four cloves of minced garlic in olive oil. This always makes my kids come running (Brett, too) because it smells so good. So then I have to shoo them away. Cooking is hard enough without people standing behind you nagging you with questions and commentary.
- Toss in a 28-oz can of diced tomatoes. Or crushed tomatoes. Or heck, plum tomatoes that you break up. Whatever.
- Add half a cup of water. You can use chicken broth but honestly I haven’t noticed a difference in taste.
- Martha says add salt but I don’t. You could though. I’m not the boss of you. (Of course neither is Martha.)
- Now add a couple of tablespoons of chopped canned Chipotle peppers in adobe sauce. I never use the whole can so what I do is buy the biggest can I can, (which still pretty small) and then freeze the rest flattened out in a baggie. I just take out the block and lop off a chunk, chop it and toss it into the tomatoes when I make this. I can’t add in as much as I’d like because the kids don’t like it as hot as I do.
- While this is bubbling away, start stripping that rotisserie chicken. Shred the meat and add it to the pot.
Martha’s recipe serves this with cilantro and feta and some tortilla chips, which is very good. My recipe depends on what’s in the cupboard:
- Avocados are good in this. Nay, they are great in this. Tonight we didn’t have any because I was at Costco last night and didn’t feel like buying half a dozen avocados when I bought my rotisserie chicken.
- Tonight I put in two cans of black beans. Sometimes I use pinto beans. It stretches the recipe by A LOT and ensures plenty of left-overs for Brett’s lunch.
- I also added a cup of frozen corn.
- I’ve served this with a sprinkle of mozzerella cheese instead of feta.
- Tonight I made cheddar nacho chips and served it with that.
- I also like to serve it with fresh salsa on top.
- I have served it with plain yogurt on top (instead of sour cream), which only Madison and I like.
Really my favorite way to serve this without the beans is as a side to a fresh green salad with fresh salsa and feta and avocado. Then it’s more like a condiment and a wonderful quick dinner in the summer. But being winter, we added the beans and it was the central part of our meal. And it was terrific as it always is.
Every year (but one) for the past eight years, we’ve headed over to Kristen‘s house for the fourth. She throws a pretty swell party and it may be Noah’s number one favorite holiday (after Christmas). I’ve noticed that in the past few months he comes most alive with he’s with his friends. Sometimes when he’s stuck at home with us I can tell that he’s just counting the minutes until he can call, message or see his people.
I like to see him with his friends (it helps that I like his friends a lot) and I like to see him stretching his way past his insular family even though I’ll miss him when he’s well and truly gone. (I’m sure he’ll visit. Some.)
Anyway. I decided that in honor of the great American tradition of the suburban potluck I’d make a Pepsi Cake. I found the recipe in a cookbook we had at work (our organization does a whole lot with small Ohio towns and one of them put out a cookbook as a fundraiser). The Pepsi Cake was a hit although I couldn’t bring myself to eat a whole piece — too sweet! Mostly I just wanted to try it because it sounded hilarious only I wanted to make it with Coca-Cola since that seemed more patriotic. Brett doesn’t like Coke as much as Pepsi because he’s blasphemous but since he’d be the one drinking the left-overs, I let him make the final decision.
The result was a very very very moist cake with a tiny bit of a bite like the first burn when you sip soda. There wasn’t any left when we headed home so I guess folks liked it (I know my father-in-law did). Next time I’d like to try it with chocolate and maybe a cherry cola. Here’s the recipe:
1 box white cake mix (didn’t I tell you it’d be very American??)
4 eggs
1/2 cup oil
1/2 cup Pepsi
Mix it all up and bake it according to the box instructions. I did it in a bundt pan but then had trouble getting it out because I need a new bundt pan. (Note: Some people add a package of vanilla pudding to this mix. And some people add nuts to the bottom of the pan.)
The topping is the kicker:
stick of butter (I use real butter even though this recipe really cries out for Oleo if you want to keep with the theme)
1/4 cup Pepsi
1/4 cup water
1 cup sugar
Stir it up on the stovetop and bring to a boil. Boil for 3 to 4 minutes then pour over the hot cake. It’ll all soak in (it may take some time so pour slowly) and you’ll end up with a very juicy cake.
Apparently cooking with soda pop is a time-honored American tradition and colas work especially well as a meat tenderizer. And when I was hunting around the internet, I also found a ton of people who make a “diet” cake by using a box of cake mix with a diet soda, no other ingredients. Stir it up and bake it. There are long bulletin board discussions about which flavors go with which flavors. Like lemon cake with diet 7-up or yellow cake with diet orange Faygo. I will leave you to that because I think this recipe is as far as I want to go down the soda pop baking path. (The diet soda cake doesn’t ring my bell AT ALL.)
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Now playing: Lynn Miles – I’m The Moon
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