Cooking and baking can be “gotta follow the recipe to get it right” or “just throw it all together and hope for the best” in approach. Every culture and country has its national dish for leftovers all thrown together. When I was growing up, it was called “mish-mash” and usually had egg noodles, onions, sour cream, and whatever else was lying around. The Japanese have, I think (if I understood a friend correctly) “okazu,” which is mostly rice, with leftovers. Hash is another variant. Anyway, you get the idea: use it up if you got it!
For some things, you don’t really need a recipe, just ingredients. Granola is perfect for this. Tonight, I did need some cooking / baking skills for chicken pie. The mish-mash side was chicken and vegetables. Leftover roast chicken, potatoes, corn cut from the cob, red pepper, onion, celery, and carrots. Sauteed the chopped up stuff in a bit of oil and butter. Boiled up new potatoes (diced), about 3, and then saved some liquid. Into this, I threw some sour cream (natch!) and homemade chicken broth. After sauteeing the other stuff in the pan (which would then go into the oven), I sprinkled the mix with some flour, stirred it up a bit, and then poured the potato water / sour cream / chicken stock over it. Season with herbs and spices. I like rosemary, sage, thyme, garlic, pepper, and bay leaves. Sometimes a lot of celery seed is also good.
Next step: biscuit dough. 1 stick butter, about 3 c. flour, a T. of powder, and a bit of salt. Add pepper if you like, or sage or parsley. Use your hands and fingers to rub the flour and butter together until crumbly. Add about 1 1/4 c. milk or cream (I had neither, so mixed up the rest of the sour cream and some water), dump it in, stir it up briefly, knead out on a floured board, shape into a lump, and roll out, adding flour as needed. Roll from center out, making a circle about the diameter of the pan you will be putting into the oven. Fold into quarters, transfer to pan, unfold, slice into it for venting, pop into the oven. Oven is preheated to 400; bake about 1 hour. Prep time – about 1 hour, so about 2 hours total.
Virtuous little housewife, ain’t I?
Ink, Yarn & Beer 