Divide and Conquer Chicken Pot Pie

Last week I received an e-mail newsletter from King Arthur Flour that included a recipe for Classic Chicken Pot Pie.  I forwarded it to my husband, who spends most of his afternoons watching the Food Network and surprising me with some fantabulous dinner when I walk in the door from work.   He found a couple of shows that demonstrated making chicken pot pie, including Anne Burrel’s Secrets of a Restaurant Chef.  We’ve watched several of her shows and the one thing both of us have noticed about her cooking is she loves salt.  This poses a problem for me, since I’m trying to cut out as much salt as I can from my diet.

Terry decided to try her recipe for Autumn Chicken Pot Pie with respect to the filling.  I decided to try the King Arthur Classic Chicken Pot Pie recipe with respect to the pastry shell.  Terry substituted potatoes for the butternut squash and pea’s for the haricot verts, the peas were not added to the simmering chicken and vegetables until the last ten minutes to insure they didn’t over cook. The gravy was made from chicken broth that had been fortified by the chicken and the vegetables cooking in it. The end result was a really rich and smooth gravy. By itself the gravy tasted wonderful, in the pot pie it seemed a little sweet without the added salt to offset the onion.

The crust recipe from KAF included a teaspoon of vinegar with the ice cold water, dribbled in by the tablespoonful.  Once I got the dough into a block, I covered it with clear wrap and refrigerated it until the filling and gravy were ready to fill the crocks.  I rolled out the dough on parchment paper, using the clear wrap as a buffer between my rolling pin and the dough.  I admit I was skeptical of the egg wash as glue between the crock and the crust, but it worked very well.

Mossy Chicken Pot Pie

“The crust was to die for, it was flaky and had a wonderful buttery taste.” –Terry

The only drawback I saw to this recipe was the amount of time it took Terry to get the filling and gravy done.   The Autumn Chicken Pot Pie recipe claims ninety minutes of ‘cook time’ but we spent nearly four hours … so we definitely have room for improvement.

Hot out of the oven, the pot pies delighted our palettes and stuffed out tummies with home-cooked goodness.

Overcoming Pie-xiety

I admit it.  I have ‘pie crust anxiety’ exactly as described in this helpful video I found via the King Arthur recipe site.   I searched for ‘pie crust’ recipes and narrowed the results down to two recipes:  the Traditional American Pie Crust (rated 3.5 stars) and the five star KAF Guaranteed Pie Crust one.  The video included many great tips and a couple of ‘secrets’ that I put into play to make the two crusts for a cherry pie.

Cherry Pie using KAF Guaranteed Pie Crust recipe
Cherry Pie using KAF Guaranteed Pie Crust recipe

I went with the five star rated recipe and I think it turned out well, don’t you?

When the Weatherman Gets the Weekend Forecast Wrong …

Sunrise Saturday 5 Mar 2011
Sunrise Saturday 5 Mar 2011

Now I’m not sure what to do today.  All week long, the weatherman has been predicting doom and gloom for today, including sleet and snow.  I had planned to start a fire in the fireplace and bake pies, bread and experiment with a chicken pot pie recipe I found last week.

But if the sunrise (click on photo to see the rest of the album) is any indication of what the rest of the day will be like, do I really want to be confined another weekend in my house?  Perhaps the dogs would like to visit the dog park today?  If nothing else, I’ll take Apollo on a longer walk this evening.  Roxy and I walked before the sunrise, when it was still only 24 degrees.

Wednesday Whine

I woke up to the second day of March with significantly more sleep than I got for the first day.  And, a stunning sunrise evolved over the course of my commute from home to Kansas City, Missouri:

Sunrise Wed 2 Mar 2011 over Kansas City, Missouri skyline
Sunrise Wed 2 Mar 2011 over Kansas City, Missouri skyline

I enjoyed my cran-raspberry white chocolate scone (baked Sunday morning) with two cups of average tea (just Lipton for easy prep)  while cleaning up log files before monitoring MOSS 2007 crawl a large content source. At least I have no meetings scheduled for today.

I’m looking forward to a short walk at lunch to take advantage of Planet Sub‘s double punch day.  This evening, I’ll take a long walk with Roxy during Wolfguard‘s practice.

Ah, the joys of tax preparation season and gathering all the necessary documentation for filing an itemized return, especially when some of your offspring don’t answer their cell phones and may never check or respond to their voice-mail messages.

And the things my husband says when I gather the appropriate information and return his call to relate said information:

“Would there happen to be a pen up here?” meaning the kitchen table.

“I have no idea.  I was a secretary for years and have no desire to be one again. I keep mine in my purse.” my reply.

“Well, I only have two places to keep a pen on me, and neither one of them pleasant.” his reply which sparked images that may scar me for the rest of my life.

While speaking to one of my offspring’s significant others, I learned all of them (my offspring and their better halves) are involved in indoor soccer leagues.  I feel so left out of the loop.  I adamantly requested photos and updates at the first opportunity.

I despair of ever catching up on my group reads.  I have at least two left over from February, bleeding over into March. I may drop everything so I can read the newly released (yesterday and in the mail to me right now via pre-order from Barnes & Nobel) The Wise Man’s Fear. The rest of my current reads pile can be found here.

And I’ve been asked to lead the discussion in two different groups, the first on Willis’ Doomsday Book and the second on Jemisin’s The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms.  As if I needed anything else to do.

SciFi and Fantasy Book Club’s currently-reading book montage

SciFi and Fantasy Book Club 4405 members
Welcome to the SciFi and Fantasy Book Club!SciFi Czar: Brad
Fantasy Czar: Cindy

Books we’re currently reading

Gardens of the MoonGardens of the Moon
by Steven Erikson
Start date: March 1, 2011

Doomsday BookDoomsday Book
by Connie Willis
Start date: March 1, 2011 

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Fantasy Book Club’s currently-reading book montage

Fantasy Book Club 2518 members

For lovers of Fantasy, monthly book discussions
February
– The Hundred Tho…

 

Books we’re currently reading

The Hundred Thousand KingdomsThe Hundred Thousand Kingdoms
by N.K. Jemisin
Start date: March 1, 2011
 

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Book Review: Peril’s Gate by Janny Wurts

Peril's Gate (Wars of Light & Shadow #6; Arc 3 - Alliance of Light, #3)Peril’s Gate by Janny Wurts
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I’m speechless and breathless (and have been for several weeks) after finishing this penultimate tipping-point volume in Janny Wurts’ Wars of Light and Shadow series. Even taking a break and reading a half dozen other books hasn’t allowed me to express the emotions that wracked me or the wonders assuaging them. Not since reading Janny’s To Ride Hell’s Chasm has a book’s pacing been so unrelenting and rewarding. And to think she wrote that novel after Peril’s Gate to step back from writing this series!

I highly recommend this book, but also strongly suggest you not start with this novel. Begin at the beginning, with Curse of the Mistwraith and immerse yourself in all things Atheran.

Please see Stefan’s outstanding review of Peril’s Gate for a concise synopsis and insightful comments.

View all my reviews

Mixed Media Meltdown

I’ve been following a debate which crops up quite frequently in reading circles:  Why can’t I resell my ebook?  Both readers and authors have joined in the discussion threads at these GoodReads SciFi & Fantasy Book Club topics:  e-Book Piracy and   Do you care if you own a work?

One of the best links posted happened to refer to Scalzi’s Whatever blog post a year ago entitled Why in Fact Publishing Will Not Go Away Anytime Soon: A Deeply Slanted Play in Three Acts.  Well worth the time and will definitely have you smiling, if not laughing out loud before you reach the stunning conclusion.

All of this got me thinking about the media used over the centuries to store our content.

Pictograms, Horseshoe Canyon, Canyonlands National Park, Utah
Pictograms, Horseshoe Canyon, Canyonlands National Park, Utah
Egyptian Hieroglyphs
Egyptian Hieroglyphs

Cuneiform script by an expert scribe, 26th century BC

Cuneiform script by an expert scribe 26th century BC

Papyrus

Papyrus
Printing press from 1811
Printing press from 1811

Edison Home Phonograph, Suitcase-Modell

Edison Home Phonograph, Suitcase-Model

19th century studio camera, with bellows for focusing

19th century studio camera, with bellows for focusing
"Super 8" 8 mm films
"Super 8" 8 mm films
A typical LP, showing its center label
A typical LP, showing its center label
Philips Cassetten-Recorder EL 3302 (1968)
Philips Cassetten-Recorder EL 3302 (1968)
Size comparison between a Betamax cassette (top) and a VHS cassette (bottom).
Beta v. VHS
Floppy Drives
Floppy Drives
The readable surface of a Compact Disc includes a spiral track wound tightly enough to cause light to diffract into a full visible spectrum
Readable surface of a Compact Disc
Six hard disk drives with cases opened showing platters and heads; 8, 5.25, 3.5, 2.5, 1.8 and 1 inch disk diameters are represented.
Six hard disk drives with cases opened showing platters and heads; 8, 5.25, 3.5, 2.5, 1.8 and 1 inch disk diameters are represented.
Cloud Computing
Cloud Computing

Out of all of the media types (and obviously many that I’ve left out like the ever popular 8-track tape), which ones can you read without the benefit of proprietary equipment or electricity?

Imagine yourself a visitor to Earth in the far future, to an Earth either abandoned (because we migrated to other planets or galaxies by discovering FTL) or lifeless (because we didn’t see the writing on the wall and continued our parasitic existence to extinction).   What format has the best chance of being understood and surviving to be reviewed?  In our mad dash to digitize everything, for convenience and experience, what do we leave for posterity?

I have boxes of albums from the 70s and 80s in my basement I can no longer listen to because I don’t own a turntable.  I even have a few 8-tracks and Beta tapes holding content hostage.  I have crates of recorded VHS tapes of movies, television shows and family gatherings, which I could possibly view, if my ancient VCR still functions and the magnetic tape hasn’t degraded or been demagnetized.   I have a project back-burnered for the moment to review several thousand slides taken by my father, his brother, his father and my aunt in the hopes of converting them to a digital photograph format.

I fear there will be no Rosetta Stone to help our alien visitors nor a still functioning DVD reader or Internet to Google the translation.  Our binary epitaph of bits and bytes may languish forever locked in silence and darkness while the humble book shines forth as a beacon of historical hope.

Singing, Snowing, Zinging, Knowing

My least favorite forecast includes ‘wintry mix’ concatenated with ‘winter storm warning’ culminating in excruciating commute times.  My vanpool dodged that bullet (barely) on the return trip home last night, for which I am very grateful.  It allowed me to watch and listen to my daughter’s first concert of the year, as a member of the Chamber Choir at the UNT College of Music.   While she is also a member of the Collegium Singers, she enjoys the challenge of increasing her repertoire in those two choirs and in her vocal performance studies individually as well.  Musicology is her primary focus as an undergraduate for the next year or so.   Living eight or ten hours north (by automobile) from her concerts would be torture if it weren’t for the appeasement offered by the College’s live streaming of most of the concerts.

Even though the concert only lasted thirty minutes, Terry and I enjoyed hearing Rachelle’s voice across the aether of cyberspace.

Immediately prior to the concert, while I shook off the last dregs of the work day, Terry tried a new recipe for stuffed tomatoes, which we barely got in the oven before the singing started.  Twenty minutes later we sampled his latest savory culinary comeuppance.  Delicious!

We opened the front door to near white out conditions.  We couldn’t see across our court to the houses on the opposite side.  Thick snow blanketed the steps and driveway, even though just ninety minutes prior there had been less than a half inch of icy, slushy, sleety mess.  We promptly closed the door and return to our regularly scheduled DVR programming.

Snow Accumulation in just 90 minutes Thursday evening
Snow Accumulation in just 90 minutes Thursday evening

Due to some systems maintenance performed overnight, I overslept by thirty minutes, awaking at 5:30 a.m.  Barely stopping to slap on some socks, I jammed on my boots, grabbed my coat and gloves and opened the garage door to an even thicker blanket of snow.  And while it looked fluffy and airy, it proved to be heavy and wet.  I began to doubt my ability to shovel just half the driveway to the street in the thirty minutes before I needed to dress for work.  My white knight came to my rescue and helped vanquish the snow dragon.   He even volunteered to do the steps while I finished my morning ablutions.

Terry drove me the two miles north to the Hallmark plant in Leavenworth so I could catch my ride to work.  As we were passing by the IHOP in Lansing, I commented that we should have had breakfast when I was awake between two and four o’clock earlier this morning.  Being such a considerate husband, he drove in a circle around the van chanting ‘na na’ at me because he planned to stop at said restaurant for breakfast on the return trip home.  True to his taunting, we saw him parked front and center at the IHOP as we headed south on K-7/US-73 (aka as Main Street in Lansing).

Our commute to Kansas City’s Midtown and Plaza regions remained uneventful, if a bit slow.  We observed several cars languishing in the medians and ditches, but we deigned to join them.  And for once, I made it to work when some of my team members decided to turn around a go home due to the icy road conditions in their part of the metro area.

Finally, and in closing, in perusing the blogs I follow as part of my morning tea sipping ritual, Modesitt posted a rebuttal to his previous blog (from earlier this week).  The earlier post, entitled ‘The Problem of Truth/Proof” generated several comments (a couple of which were mine), which then spurred Mr. Modesitt’s posting this morning, entitled “True” Knowledge is Not an Enemy of Faith.  I will monitor this blog throughout the day to follow the next wave of comments, but will probably refrain from commenting myself.

May you all have a restful and peaceful weekend!

Midweek Mull

Perhaps I’m in a funk because at least one of the four books I’m currently reading is a dystopian classic by Sinclair Lewis entitled It Can’t Happen Here (1936), part of my journey into various warped zones.   Perhaps it’s just hormonal, pre-menopausal doldrums.  Not enough fruit, vegetables and exercise?

I did purchase a new battery for my pedometer, hoping the predicted snow for later this week leaves only a dusting so I and my Rotts can get back in shape.  We could all benefit from a brisk walk and fresh air to invigorate our outlook on life.

My outlook dimmed after reading L.E. Modesitt’s recent blog post about the problem of proving truth.  I attempted to comment, probably not very eloquently, nor diplomatically, but again, my fug lens needs cleansing.

I do have my daughter’s first concert of the spring semester to look forward to tomorrow evening.  One of the choirs she’s a member of (Chamber Choir) performs a short concert at 6:30 pm, streamed live over the Internet.  She’s listed in the program under the Altos as Rachelle Moss, mostly because the color of her voice lands her in that section nine times out of ten.  I do miss hearing her rehearsing at home.

I’ll get little rest, peace or quite tonight (so I might as well walk the dogs) since it’s practice night for my husband’s rock band.  I just wish it wasn’t dark so early, because I could take my camera with me while walking and probably snap a few interesting photos.  I don’t want to start yet another book (on audio via my phone) nor do I want to re-hash all the old MP3s I’ve let languish there.  Guess I’ll just talk to Roxy or Apollo until they howl me silent.

I did finish my third crochet project of the year, but haven’t had a chance to photograph Terry modeling his new scarf.  He did wear it yesterday when he was out and about, but said it was so warm he had to remove it.  At least he won’t be cold the next time we have a frigid blizzard in February.

Today I wish my mom a very Happy Birthday.  Here’s a photo of her from 1965 helping me celebrate my first birthday:

My Mom, me and my cousins in 1965
My Mom, me and my cousins in 1965

Not by Bread Alone

Decadent describes my husband’s first pecan pie.  See for yourself.  You’ll have to take my word on the richness of the flavor though:

Chocolate Pecan Pie
Chocolate Pecan Pie

Terry didn’t provide me with a link to the recipe.  When/if he does, I’ll update this post.

I thought to try a new Italian bread recipe, just for the chance to bake with my Italian bread pan.

I made a mistake, however, in reading the ingredients and used two tablespoons of sugar instead of just two teaspoons.  I may have to try again today. My other modifications to the recipe are listed below in bold:

Dough

  • 4 cups King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour (Kroger’s Organic All-Purpose Flour)
  • 2 tablespoons potato flour, or 1/4 cup dried potato flakes
  • 1/4 cup Baker’s Special Dry Milk or nonfat dry milk
  • 2 teaspoons salt
  • 2 teaspoons sugar (my mistake … I used 2 Tablespoons)
  • 2 teaspoons instant yeast
  • 1 1/3 cups lukewarm water (1 cup only; I also used 1/2 cup sourdough starter)
  • 3 tablespoons olive oil

Topping

  • 1 egg white beaten with 1 tablespoon water; or substitute Quick Shine
  • sesame seeds

Directions

  1. In a large bowl, stir together all of the dough ingredients till cohesive. Knead the dough for 5 to 8 minutes, until it’s smooth and supple, adding more water or flour as needed.  I used my Kitchenaid mixer with a dough hook.  I let the water, sugar and yeast proof for 5-10 minutes in the bowl while I measured out the other ingredients.
  2. Cover the dough and allow it to rise for 1 hour, or until it’s doubled in bulk.  I let it rise for about 90 minutes (mostly because I was preoccupied watching a movie).
  3. Transfer the dough to a lightly greased work surface and divide it into two pieces. Shape each piece into a smooth 16″ log. Place the logs into the two wells of a lightly greased Italian bread pan, cover, and let the loaves rise until very puffy, about 1 hour.  I love my Italian bread pan (see photo above).
  4. Brush the loaves with the egg wash (or spray them with Quick Shine), then sprinkle heavily with sesame seeds. Bake in a preheated 400°F oven for about 25 minutes, until the loaves are golden brown. For the crispiest crust, turn off the oven, prop the door open, and allow the bread to cool in the oven.  I brushed with an egg-white wash and sprinkled liberally with sesame seeds.  I also scored each loaf three times with my razor-sharp lame.  Again, I misread the directions and baked at 425 degrees for 25 minutes.  I spritzed the oven every five minutes with water from a spray bottle to encourage a crispy crust.  I also let the loaves cool in the oven.

We enjoyed some home-made baked Italian sandwiches courtesy Terry’s early life experiences working for his father at the Grinder Man in Wichita, Kansas.  Terry’s dad conceived, owned and operated several Grinder Man sandwich shops in Wichita during the 70s and 80s.  Sadly, only one remains open now.

Sun Set, Moon Rise

I look forward to my Friday evening commutes home.  Especially with the phenomenal weather this week … highs in the 60s and 70s, calm winds, clear or nearly clear skies.  Even though we experienced a blizzard a few days ago, now this!  I began to wish I’d brought my camera with me to work on Friday as we drove westward.  My cell phone can not do justice to the beauty my eye beheld:

I-435 and K-5 looking southwest at 5:00 pm Friday
I-435 and K-5 looking southwest at 5:00 pm Friday

In fact, after taking the photograph above (and sending it via SMS to Facebook and Twitpic), I called my hubby and told him I needed my SLR camera as soon as I got home.  I believed a great sunset was in the making.  True to my word, I rushed in the door, grabbed my SD card from Terry’s computer, snatched up the tripod, transferred the tipod adaptor from my videocamera to my SLR, inserted fresh batteries and raced to the Bonneville with only about ten minutes to spare before the sun touched the western horizon.

My first thought was to find a location, free of tall trees, tall houses and preferably on a hill.  I wound my way through the neighborhood behind my house finally reaching Lost 80 Park on East Mary Street in Lansing, only to discover the gates tightly chained and locked.  I continued east on Mary and took a left at K-5, winding my way past the prison, the Lansing water works and finally reaching Mount Muncie Cemetery with just moments to spare.  The entrance to the cemetery included a circle drive up and to the right of the main entrance, overlooking the small industrial park located behind the old Rusy Eck Ford dealership.  Nothing between me and the western horizon but a couple of small powerlines (in the foreground) and clear air.

I quickly setup the tripod, attached the camera, leaving the zoom lens attached, made some adjustments to it’s setup (AWB set to cloudy, two second shutter delay, shutter priority and manual focus) and began taking a series of shots, experimenting with different shutter speeds (beginning at 1/90th of a second and working my way down over the course of twenty minutes to as low as 1/8th of a second).  This album contains the entire series of forty-six shots.   But the shots below are a couple of my favorites from that series:

Sunset from Mount Muncie Cemetery, Leavenworth, Kansas on Friday, 18 Feb 2011
Sunset from Mount Muncie Cemetery, Leavenworth, Kansas on Friday, 18 Feb 2011
Sunset (northwest) from Mount Munce Cemetary, Leavenworth, Kansas on Friday, 18 Feb 2011
Sunset (northwest) from Mount Munce Cemetary, Leavenworth, Kansas on Friday, 18 Feb 2011

I returned home, even though I would have liked to wait for moon rise, which I knew would occur within an hour or so, since yesterday was a full moon.  But, most cemeteries prefer people to go home after dark, except for the residents of course.

Just as Terry and I began eating some pizza (and while his Chocolate Pecan Pie baked), my father arrived unexpectedly to return a DVD and a couple of portraits I had asked him to digitize for me.  He commented as he came through the front door that the moon and clouds looked spectacular.  As you can imagine, I grabbed the tripod and camera to snap a few more photos, with limited success.  I’ve got more research to do with respect to photographing the full moon.  This was a passable attempt:

Almost Full Moon with Clouds Friday Evening, 18 Feb 2011
Almost Full Moon with Clouds Friday Evening, 18 Feb 2011

I had hoped to awaken early, load up the equipment and journey eastward to Wynandotte County Lake Park to catch a reflective sunrise, but I stayed up to late watching Star Trek VI and overslept.  In way I’m glad I overslept, as I awoke to complete cloud cover and the threat of rain. So, rather than being a shutterbug today, I will crochet, clear off my DVR and maybe read a book or two.

Enjoy your weekend!