Wednesday, December 16, 2009

"Aroma from a Guest Kitchen" - (Guest:Padmaja Vaithi)= Grilled Chicken And Roasted Red Pepper Sandwiches with Fontina Cheese

Aroma From a Guest Kitchen :
In this new segment I will be asking my Friends/Guests/Contributors to share their Kitchen creations, recipes, thoughts..... with all of us here.

Today's Guest : Padmaja Vaithi
My good friend from Ithaca,NY who shares a passion for food with me, is an awesome baker (we can ask her for her cake recipes for future contributions!) and a very good person...ofcourse!

Padma Says:
Almost every weekend I prepare the menu for the following week, before I go to do my grocery shopping. If that week’s menu is not on my kitchen board, Monday’s lunch is bread. (For my husband)
Having the menu planned ahead helps me include all food groups and different cuisines, group meals with intense labor with least work and also in sync with day to day activities, makes me work faster and more effectively…… especially with the prep work and a lot with my catering.
This week, as always I put out the same question to my husband “What do you want for next week?” Instead of his usual “whatever” or “observed silence” he said Chicken Sandwich with ………..some ingredients that randomly popped out of his mouth…………..I looked at him for a moment as if asking “Does this even make sense or are you just mocking at me?” Studying that LOOK ………which I’m sure is every wife’s weapon he said “Come on, surprise me.”

Well that is very easy for me; I could just send an empty box for lunch. What could be more surprising than that? (As suggested by my younger sister.)

However, I didn’t have to try too hard either. I have this faithful binder full of recipes cut out from magazines and sorted into groups : JUST FOR KIDS, CAKES, DESSERTS, PASTA, ONLY CHICKEN………..there must be a Chicken Sandwich recipe in here somewhere and sure there it was.
"Grilled Chicken and Roasted Red Pepper Sandwich with Fontina Cheese", Cooking Light (June 2004).…it was a cover recipe.. .
Naturally, the cover picture and the recipe from the magazine is its best marketing tool, so I showed that picture to my husband and it got sold. He said sure……..
Lately, I discovered this combination of Dijon mustard, thyme, lemon and chicken to be mouth watering good in Martha’s Crusty Mustard Chicken recipe. If you want to try this combination start with this Sandwich recipe. It sure didn’t fail surprising my husband’s taste buds……
Try serving it with a hearty soup (Like a Cheddar Soup) and/or with some vegetable chips to round off the meal to that wholesome finish.



Grilled Chicken and Roasted Red Pepper Sandwiches with Fontina Cheese
Ingredients:
Chicken Breast Halves - 1 Lb, skinless, boneless
Fresh Lemon Juice - 1 tbsp
Dijon Mustard - 1 tbsp
Extra Virgin Olive Oil- 2 tsp
Dried marjoram - ¼ tsp
Dried thyme - ¼ tsp
Garlic cloves - 5 nos, minced and divided
Cooking spray
Onion - 1 Cup, vertically sliced
Sugar - 1 tsp
Fennel seeds - ¾ tsp, crushed
Red Pepper flakes - ¼ tsp
Salt - ¼ tsp
Roasted Red Bell Pepper - 1 Bottle, (7 Oz), drained and sliced
 Buy the roasted bell pepper from the “Mediterranean Bar” rather than the bottled kind.
The bottled kind has water to its weight, which is wasted.
Red Wine Vinegar - 1 tbsp
Freshly ground black pepper - 1/8 tsp
Rosemary Focaccia - 1 Loaf (12 Oz), cut in half horizontally
Low-fat Mayonnaise - 4 tsp
Fontina Cheese - 3 Oz, thinly sliced

Yields: 4 servings. (Serving size: 1 sandwich quarter).
462 (24% from fat); Fat: 12.2g (sat: 4.7g, mono: 3.7g, poly: 1.7g);

Calories:
Protein: 39.5g; Carb: 51.2g; Fiber: 5.6g; Chol: 90 mg; Iron: 3 mg; Sodium 981 mg; Calc: 199mg
Source: Cooking light magazine. Cover Recipe.

Cost:
Wegmans – Boneless, skinless breast chicken - $5.66
Lemon - $0.79
Dried thyme (Bulk Section) - $0.08
Flora - Roasted red bell peppers, 12 Oz - $2.69
Wegmans – Focaccia Bread - $3.50
Fontina cheese, 3 Oz (Val D’Aost) - $5.12
TOTAL = $17.84



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