Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Buffalo Chicken Sandwiches

photo by Alison Tyne
I had a great time recently with my friend, the wonderful artist Alison Tyne. We spent a few days together discussing photography, businesses, and of course, food. Poor Alison had never before had a buffalo chicken sandwich! Luckily I was there to remedy the situation.

This recipe is a nice one if you are feeling lazy or just too tired to create a complex meal. It's easily adaptable for vegetarians through the use of soy chick'n nuggets (pictured).




Ingredients - per sandwich
  • 1 breaded chicken patty (or 4 soy chick'n nuggets)
  • hot sauce, such as Frank's Red Hot
  • 1 fresh sandwich roll
  • blue cheese or ranch dressing
  • 1/2 stalk celery, sliced
  • (see note below)
Directions
  1. Cook chicken patty according to package directions.
  2. Pour hot sauce into a small bowl. Dredge the patty in hot sauce and place on bun.
  3. Top with salad dressing and sprinkle with celery. Serve immediately.
Note: Norm makes a good point in the comments for those who don't like their sandwich full-strength. You can control how hot the sauce is by adding a little melted butter to your hot sauce, which will chill it out but still leave a little pizazz.

    Tuesday, September 13, 2011

    Easy Balsamic Vinaigrette

    Wow, it's been an interesting few months. In my part of New York State, we've been dealing recently with major flooding - the first day of school was cut short and the rest of the week canceled. It's been kind of unreal, to help people rip apart their houses, haul out furniture that has gone bad from being saturated with flood water, and pump out basements. Please send good thoughts to the Southern Tier as many deal with the effects of the flood.

    I am hoping to ease back into blogging with a wonderfully easy salad dressing recipe. The base of it is one I've been using for a few months, but discovered the special ingredient while watching an episode of The Pioneer Woman's show on Food Network.

    I love making my own salad dressing, and I hope you will too. Once you see how easy it is to manipulate with different flavors (such as adding in some Dijon mustard, or using a different kind of vinegar), you can have a lot of fun with it.

    Ingredients (serves 2-3)
    • 1/4 cup olive oil
    • 4 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
    • a few shakes each of salt and freshly ground pepper
    • 2 tsp brown sugar (if gluten-free, make sure to use a GF brown sugar, such as Domino brand)
    Directions
    1. Combine all ingredients in a resealable container. Shake well before serving.

      Note: Store on the shelf, not in the fridge, as olive oil will coagulate.