they call me "the carb queen"

when i came home from college during winter break, i was looking forward to eating stuff that i can't get in delaware [jamba juice, in-n-out, coco's, etc]. as dumb as this sounds, i was really craving some food from this place in the food court called cajun grill. i was devastated when i found out that they closed while i was away and i've missed it ever since.

so i did some googling and ended up tracking down the recipe for their bourbon chicken [one of my favorites!]. i was very excited to try this one :] i served it over brown rice with some onion roasted potatoes and popovers. yes, rice, potatoes and bread in one meal. some days you just need to eat a crapload of carbs.

the chicken had a familiar taste, but no, it wasn't right on the money. it would be a lot better had i never had cajun grill before but because i have, i had high expectations. however, i didn't have the ground ginger that the recipe called for so that may have something to do with it. also, i used chicken breasts rather than thighs/dark meat. next time, i'll stick with the breasts, but cut them into smaller pieces and brown them a bit more.

kelly’s cajun grill bourbon chicken

ingredients:
1 1/2 lbs. of Thigh Meat or Dark Meat (cut in bite size chunks)
2 Tbsp. Teriyaki Sauce
1/2 tsp. Worcestershire Sauce
1/2 tsp. Garlic Salt
1/2 tsp. Ginger Powder
3 Tbsp. Brown Sugar
1 Tbsp. Granulated Sugar
1 C. White Grape Juice
1/2 C. Bourbon
1/4 C. water

directions:
Mix teriyaki sauce, Worcestershire sauce, garlic salt, ginger, brown sugar 1/2 cup white grape juice and bourbon. Stir until thoroughly blended.

Pour 1/3 sauce on chicken pieces and mix. Refrigerate for 3 hours or best overnight. Save remainder sauce and refrigerate.

Braise chicken with marinate on medium low heat until cooked and brown. Remove from frying pan. In a 2 quart sauce pan heat remainder of bourbon sauce and add 1/2 cup of white grape juice and 1 Tbsp. of sugar with 1/4 cup water. Bring to a simmer and stir until sugar is dissolved. Add chicken to sauce and stir until chicken are well coated.

Note: I actually liked these better the next day. I heated some leftover chicken in about a cup of sauce in a small frying pan until the sauce pretty much evaporated. This made this chicken take on a nice brown color and it became a lot more flavorful.

plain popovers
[from baking bites]

ingredients:
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs, room temperature
1 cup milk (low fat is fine)
melted butter, for brushing

directions:
Preheat the oven to 425F.

Grease a 6-cup muffin tin (or the middle 6 cups of a 12-cup tin) well with the melted butter and place in preheated oven for 1-2 minutes.

In a large bowl, whisk together the eggs, milk and salt. Sift flour over mixtre and whisk until smooth.

Remove heated muffin tin from oven and divide the batter evenly into the buttered muffin cups. Bake for 20 minutes at 425F, then rotate the pan (to ensure even cooking) and reduce oven heat to 350F. Bake for an additional 10 minutes, until golden brown and crisp.

Remove from pan and cool on a wire rack. Makes 6 popovers.