blog — molly yeh

midwest

paprikash hotdish

in , ,

I am not up and at ‘em at 3 o'clock in the morning like I thought I would be because it turns out I’ve not been caught by westbound jet lag, which is a shame because westbound jet lag is almost as good as airplane ravioli. It's all because we became night owls in Berlin. While at home we can barely stay awake to finish Homeland, in Berlin we had no bedtime and stayed out well past the last call for hummus, discussing deli culture and gefilte fish over *just one round of arak* (in Berlin, i know, we'll get to that!). And then in the mornings we were lucky if we'd acquired our ein kleiner kaffee zu mitnehmen bitte and gotten on the u-bahn by 11. It'd weird me out when I’d get text messages from friends at home around then, “What is Michelle doing texting me in the middle of the night?!" I'd think, and then it'd occur to me that it was a normal New York waking hour. 

Which is all to say that we did a terrible job of adjusting to Berlin time, and thus have very little work to do now in the way of adjusting back to Grand Forks time. (And which is also to say that we could have easily spent our entire Friday night at the Berghain if Eggboy would have allowed us to attempt to get in lol.) 

I have a bunch of photos that I'm going to put together for you and then I'll tell you more about my trip, but today I've got to get going on testing Passover recipes and unpacking and telling you about this hotdish! According to a lot of instagrams and the fact that Eggboy is laundering all of his insulated coveralls at once in order to put them away for the warmer months, spring is here. Peas are here, rhubarb is here, chives are here, supposedly, but out my window it is still deliciously cloudy parka weather, which means that hotdishes are still *ok*. And I am really excited about this Paprikash hotdish because if Chinese hotdish is my stripper name, Paprikash hotdish is totally my other stripper name, as a nod to my Hungarian half. I love Paprikash and typically have it with dumplings or crusty buttery sourdough, but do you know what is equally as good as both of those things? Tater tots, duh. 

The filling is based on my chicken pot tater tot hotdish but it's flavored like a paprikash, meaning more onion and a load of paprika. So much paprika. Get new paprika because paprika loses its flavor really quickly if it's sitting on your spice shelf. I realize that peas and carrots aren't traditional paprikash ingredients but neither are tater tots, and in the interest of adding more veggies to make this a one-pot meal, I've dumped some in. The result is a v creamy, v comforting supper that's best when shoveled into your mouth out of a large deep bowl. And as you can see, this can totally be wrapped up and stuck in the freezer for later or to bring to a friend's house, just allow for an hour and a half or so in the oven if you're baking it from frozen!

Happy hotdishing! 

paprikash hotdish

makes 6 to 8 servings

ingredients

1/4 c butter

2 large onions, sliced

3 large carrots, chopped

Kosher salt

Black pepper

4 cloves garlic, minced

3 tb hungarian sweet paprika

1/2 tsp cayenne

1 tb tomato paste

6 tb flour

1/2 c dry white wine

2 c whole milk

enough chicken broth base for 2 c liquid** 

20 oz pounds boneless skinless chicken thigh, cut into 1/2- or 3/4-inch pieces

3/4 c peas

20 ounces tater tots

**a bouillon cube or something of the equivalent, like better than bouillon or homemade concentrate. since different brands require a different amount of mix per cup of liquid, check the manufacturer's instructions. don't dilute it in water! 

clues

preheat the oven to 400ºf. 

in a large skillet, melt the butter over medium high heat. add the onion, carrots, a good pinch of salt, and a few turns of pepper and cook, stirring until the onions and carrots are soft, about 10 minutes. add the garlic, paprika, cayenne, and tomato paste and cook for one more minute.

stir in the flour so that it gets evenly distributed and cook for one more minute. add the wine and stir until thickened. then add half of the milk, stirring constantly until thickened, and repeat with the other half of the milk. stir in the chicken broth base and chicken. cook, stirring often, until the chicken is cooked through and no longer pink, 15 minutes. stir in the peas. taste and adjust seasonings as desired. 

transfer the mixture to an 11" by 8" baking dish (or other 3-quart ovenproof dish) and cover with tater tots. arrange them snugly and neatly. bake until the tots are golden brown. begin checking for doneness at 30 minutes. let cool slightly and serve!

or, let cool slightly, cover tightly with plastic and refrigerate or freeze until ready to cook. it'll last 2 days in the refrigerator and 3 months in the freezer. 

-yeh!

strawberry and peanut butter cookie salad

in ,

i don't know if you and i have ever truly sat down and discussed the elephant that fills up the entirety of the upper midwest: there are no vegetables in salad. salads here contain jell-o and mayonnaise and sweets of all sorts (whatever, yes, grapes), but unless you specify a vegetable salad, there's a very good chance that asking a true midwesterner to bring a salad to the potluck will mean making more room for dessert. 

the salad chapters in the stack of church cookbooks sitting beside me are my favorite. oddly they're where you'd expect a salad chapter to be, right after the appetizers and before the mains, but ingredients like miniature marshmallows, cool whip, and cream cheese make regular appearances. after experiencing a few long winters here, the best reason i can think of for not using vegetables would be limited access to fresh ones. but why marshmallows? why cookies? do you know why? this all sometimes feels like a never-ending punchline where the joke is actually on me because in the end, i get to eat salad and have my cookies too. 

out of all of my new midwestern food friends, cookie salad might be the one that i've had the most fun with. a typical cookie salad is fudge striped cookies, vanilla pudding, buttermilk, cool whip, and mandarin oranges or bananas. you can find a recipe for that here. but when you start making substitutions and taking liberties like a millennial, you realize that a cookie salad is not so different from an eton mess or perhaps a breakfast parfait. 

i have an eton mess inspired version of a cookie salad in the latest issue of saveur along with a little story that i really want to show you! i had so much fun with it. i haven't seen it yet because magazines just take longer to get here, but perhaps if you're near a newsstand, you could pick one up??

and then here is another version of a cookie salad. it's a slightly healthier take, as the cream and pudding get swapped out for yogurt, but it feels right for both breakfast and dessert. you can use plain yogurt, as i usually do, especially if it's for breakfast, or you can use any flavored variety that you'd like. it's also embarrassingly easy. are you ready?

strawberry and peanut butter cookie salad

ingredients

for each serving you will need:

a big plop of yogurt

a handful or two of peanut butter cookie crumbs (i used this recipe)

fresh sliced strawberries

and, yes, sprinkles

 

clues

stir all of the ingredients together in a bowl and serve immediately or the next day (it's actually really good the next day when the cookies have absorbed some of the yogurt!) or layer them artfully in individual dishes and let your guests toss their own salads. 

enjoy!

-yeh!

thank you to the wonderful celeste for stopping by and helping me make these little cookie salads on her drive across the country! come back, celeste! we forgot to eat them! 

pictured: coasters // glasses // wooden spoon

tater tot chicken pot hotdish

in

spring planting started yesterday and all i can think about is how grateful i am for the world synchronized skating championship online webcast. hehe. oops? i know, i should be celebrating spring planting (i am! here, have a cake!) but, like, any other time, i probably would have been a little salty if eggboy had tout à coup called way past dinner time to say that it would be another many hours before pizza o'clock, and last night it was received with something more to the effect of, ok the entirety of team russia 2 is dressed like black swan, there are tiaras, they're about to swizzle, g'bye. 

is this what being a farm wife is???

oh right! that and planning dinners that last for a long while on the stove or in the oven for the unpredictable nature of "dinnertime during farming season." we learned how to do that last year though, during the great sugar beet harvest shakshuka slow-poach showdown. whatever that means. now it's just a matter of getting back into the swing of things and not making delicate time-sensitive food like soufflés or al dente noodles.

i know, i don't even make soufflés or al dente noodles during non-farming season. but you know what i mean.

so i figured it was high a time as any to put my first tater tot hotdish recipe out into the world!

omg tots omg tots.

i know, they're moment-ing in brooklyn right now. 

but let me tell you about 1980s upper midwest church cookbooks and tater tot hotdish: they are married. tater tot hotdish is quintessential comfort food for eggboy and eggdad and egggrandma. tater tot hotdish : eggdad :: mum's mac and cheese : me. it's a staple at potlucks and you're not a minnesotan until you can properly apply a layer of tater tots to a 9 X 13 casserole dish of creamed soup.

let's review our hotdish definition: a meat, a creamed soup, a vegetable, and a starch, dumped together and baked until hot. typically a tater tot hotdish is hamburger meat, cream of something (mushroom?) soup, and peas or green beans under a bed of store-bought tater tots. mine is inspired by chicken pot pie: chicken, béchamel, and vegetables. 

and thyme. and miniature. and yes, store-bought tater tots, for now. 

tater tot chicken pot hotdish

makes 4-5 servings

ingredients

2 tb unsalted butter (or olive oil)

1 small onion, finely chopped

2 carrots, finely chopped

optional: other chopped sturdy veggies! celery, potatoes, and broccoli would all be great

1/4 c all-purpose flour

2 c whole or 2% milk

enough chicken bouillon for 2 c liquid*

1 lb boneless skinless chicken thigh or breast, chopped into bite-sized pieces

1/2 c frozen peas

1/4 t dried thyme

optional: other herbs! rosemary and parsley are nice!

black pepper

frozen tater tots! about a pound of them.

 

*i like orrington farms brand, which requires 2 tsp mix per cup, but other brands, like better than bouillon i believe only require 1 tsp. best to check the instructions.  

clues

preheat oven to 400.

in a large skillet over medium high heat, melt the butter and add the onion, carrots, and any other veggies, stirring until soft, 7-10 minutes. stir in the flour so that it gets evenly distributed. add 1 cup of the milk, stirring until thickened, and then add the second cup, stirring until thickened.

add the bouillon, chicken, peas, thyme, any other herbs you’d like, and pepper, and simmer, stirring often, for 10-15 minutes, until the chicken is fully cooked. taste the mixture and adjust seasonings, if desired.

transfer the mixture to a 2-2 1/2 quart casserole dish or 4-5 mini cocottes--and then cover with tater tots. 

bake for 20-25 minutes, until the tots are golden brown.

let cool slightly and enjoy!