Sweet Smokey Chicken

This is basically a slight modification of a recipe known as "Frank's Other Favorite".  The original recipe came from a wonderful little cookbook called "365 Ways To Cook Chicken" (Copyright 1986).

The original recipe described the dish as one of two favorite chicken dishes of Frank Perdue, late President and CEO of Perdue farms.  The original dish used a whole cut up chicken with skin, and I've also modified the sauce by bumping up the maple and adding a touch of Chipotle Tabasco.

Ingredients

• up to 4, 5-6 oz chicken breasts
• one medium or large onion, the sweeter (Texas 509, Vidalia, etc) the better
• Hickory smoked salt (or kosher salt and liquid smoke)
• 1/4 cup ketchup
• 1/3 cup maple syrup (REAL)
• 2 tbl apple cider vinegar
• 1 tbl dijon mustard
• 3-4 dashes of Chipotle Tabasco

Steps

• Thickly slice the onion and line a rectangular glass pan with the slices
• Lightly salt the chicken on both sides with the hickory smoked salt OR rub the chicken with  liquid smoke and sprinkle both sides with kosher salt.
• Place the chicken on top of the onion slices
  
  
• Put together the sauce by adding together the ketchup, maple, vinegar, dijon, and tabasco.  Mix well and pour over the chicken
  
  
  
• Bake at 350 for 50 minutes, basting the chicken with the sauce about 1/2 way through.
• Serve chicken with onions and a little bit of sauce.

Bobotie

Bobotie is the national dish of South Africa.  It is a meat pie, similar but not the same as a meat loaf.  This is my rendition of a Weight Watcher's version of the dish.

I've replaced curry powder with curry paste, bumped up the cumin, replaced allspice for cloves, increased the wine and allowed for the choice of apricot preserves instead of the chutney.  The other thing I've found that works well for the chutney is a de-heated pepper jelly like Suan's Scotch Bonnet Pepper Jelly.  I like to mix it with the apricot preserves.

I also replaced milk with buttermilk.

The resulting dish has a tight sweetness that is complemented by the heat.  It's one of those dishes that tastes just as good (or better) the next day.

• 1 lb lean hamburger (90/10)
• 1 medium uncooked onion, finely chopped
• 2 medium Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored, and finely chopped
• 1/2 cup carrot, peeled and finely chopped
• 3/4 cup dried cranberries 
• 2 bay leaves
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 1 tbl curry paste (I use yellow, though massimun would work as well)
• 1 1/2 tsp kosher salt
• 1 tsp chili powder
• 1 tsp cumin
• 1/2 tsp coriander
• 1/2 tsp ground allspice
• 1/4 tsp black pepper
• 1/2 cup red wine
• 3 tbls apricot preserves or mango chutney (or a mix of them)
• 2 large eggs
• 1/2 cup buttermilk

Brown the ground beef over medium-high heat until all pink is gone.  Remove from pan and set aside

In the same skillet, add the onion, apples, carrots, cranberries, and bay leaves.  Cook on medium-low heat until soft (about 10 mins).  Add the garlic, curry paste, and dry spices and cook 2 minutes.

Add the meat and the wine, stir well and make sure to dissolve any dried / stuck bits.  Simmer for 5 minutes.  Remove the heat, remove the bay leaves, stir in the preserves/chutney.

Spoon the mixture into a sprayed 9x9 glass pan.

Mix the eggs and buttermilk, pour over the mixture and tip the pan around to cover.

Bake at 375 for 25 minutes.

Makes 8 servings