My first Paper Chef entry. For those of you who don’t know, this is Tomatillo’s version of the Iron Chef. Ingredients are posted and you need to cook up something using those ingredients within a certain timeframe. I had a dinner party last night and was not brave enough to experiment on them, so this became my Sunday challenge. (Thank you Owen for extending the deadline for posting to Monday!)
Potatoes, cabbage, chicken, and lemon. The lemon was easy for me, as I personally think you can add a splash of lemon juice to almost anything. I thought of soup. I often make a soup of chicken broth, cabbage, kale, beans, zucchini, and so forth that could easily fit the criteria by adding a bit of lemon juice, which improves many soups. Or a stew maybe, with more potato.
Then I thought about stuffed cabbage, typically made with ground beef and rice and I thought I might do up a chicken and potato version of the stuffed cabbage. That is still intriguing to me and I might do it another day.
Then I thought of Colcannon or Bubble and Squeak. A hash of sorts, with potatoes and cabbage. Chicken could be added. I explored a few cookbooks and a few Internet sites and found Ming’s Shallot-soy Marinated Chicken with Melted Cabbage. I thought of crossing that with the Bubble & Squeak and skipping the skin on the chicken. I modified the marinade a bit as I prefer using brown sugar with Asian dishes somehow… I don’t know why. Does brown sugar have any connection? I think of brown sugar as being an island thing… And I changed the proportions a bit.
Chicken with Sauteed Potatoes and Cabbage
Ingredients
- 5 chicken tenders
- 1/4 cup brown mustard
- 2 green onions, chopped
- 2 Tbs balsamic vinegar
- 2 Tbs rice wine vinegar
- 1 Tbs lemon juice
- 3 Tbs soy sauce
- 1 Tbs brown sugar
- 1/2 cup olive oil
- 1 Tbs oil
- 1 Tbs butter
- 5 potatoes, peeled and diced
- salt and pepper to taste
- 1 Tbs oil
- 1 head cabbage, quarter and sliced in 1/4″ pieces
- juice of 1 lemon
- salt and pepper to taste
- red wine vinegar to taste
Instructions
Marinade for Chicken
- In a food processor or blender, mix together the mustard, green onions, vinegars, soy sauce, and brown sugar. Slowly add the oil and mix until well blended. I only used about half of this to marinate the chicken so will need to do something else with the rest. I marinated the chicken tenders for about an hour, but if I’d actually made a decision about what to cook sooner, I would have happily done it all day and think it would have been improved.
Sauteed Potatoes
- Peel and dice the potatoes and cook in the butter and oil. Basically, make sauteed potatoes. Remove to a dish when crispy and keep warm.
Sauteed Chicken Tenders
- Add another bit of oil and add the chicken tenders. I browned the chicken in the oil and then put in a 400 degree oven to finish cooking while I cooked the cabbage.
Sauteed Cabbage
- I added another tablespoon of oil and put in the sliced cabbage, stirring about 10 minutes until softened, seasoning with salt and pepper and lemon juice. If I were to do this again, I’d add some vinegar now. We came up with the need for vinegar at the table so added it then. And a bit more salt.
- When the cabbage was softened, I added back the potatoes and made sure everything was heated up. The chicken was done by then. I put the cabbage and potatoes in the serving dish, sliced up the chicken, and put it on top.
In Summary
The kids had seen the sautéed potatoes, a kid-tested favorite, and had been sneaking pieces throughout the cooking session, then ran off to play before they saw the sin of my mixing them with the cabbage. Oh, the groans when they came to the table! Cabbage is a hard one to make kids like somehow. They’ll eat it raw, happily, but not cooked, except in soups. From the kids’ point of view, the chicken was “really good” but I ruined the potatoes by mixing them with the cabbage. They did eat some, and under no threats other than my standard: A well-balanced dinner merits dessert.
From the adult point of view, it was good. Once the vinegar was added, it was really quite good! And I’m not a big huge fan of cooked cabbage either. I like it more, perhaps, than fish, but it’s not really high on “the list.”
Perhaps there ought to be a “best of three” competition, where we each make three dishes using the same ingredients and then promote our favorite. Because I’m still curious about doing the stuffed cabbage. Oh–I also considered burritos with sautéed potatoes, cabbage, and chicken with some hoisin sauce. Sort of a mu shu chicken thing.
Colcannon, bubble & squeak, fried cabbage & potatoes–no matter what you call it–it’s great! Keep on presenting interesting combinations to the kids–they will learn to like them eventually. I can taste it from here!