Gluten Free Fried Chicken

If you read my post from yesterday all the way through, you may have seen that I planned on cooking fried chicken sometime this month. So what? you say. Well, let me tell you about fried chicken.

In the early days when I could still eat all things gluten, I loved me some fried chicken. I was a frequent flier at the neighborhood Church's Fried Chicken, KFC, and Mrs. Winner's places. We had fried chicken about twice a week---always bought somewhere already fried and ready to eat. My personal philosophy about fried chicken is that even though I know how to make it, there was no reason for me to do it myself and deprive one of those places of my business, since they did a pretty good job of cooking it and then they were the ones who had to clean up the mess. So, if I was going to cook chicken at home, it would usually be baked in the oven in a disposable pan, or in the crockpot with a crockpot liner. Delicious, then a breeze to clean up. I DO know how to cook fried chicken, I just don't like to.

Last summer, I made some gluten free fried chicken for FabGrandpa. He was surprised because in all the years we have been married, I have never made fried chicken for him. He asked me why I had never made it and I told him "A girl has to have some secrets." Why tell him I know how to do something if I ain't gonna do it, right?

So, anyway, he loved the fried chicken I made last year. He loved it so much he has asked me several times to make it again. Well, today I made him some fried chicken again. And his response? "It took you 16 years to make it for me the first time, I'm surprised it only took 1 year for you to make it the second time."

Here is how to make gluten free fried chicken:

Chicken Pieces
salt and pepper to taste
tenderizer
1 cup of your favorite gluten free all purpose flour mix
1 cup milk
1 cup Crisco or oil

Heat the oil in a large skillet with a lid. Wash the chicken pieces. Sprinkle with tenderizer, salt and pepper. Roll in the flour mix, then dip in the milk, then roll in the flour mix again. Put in the skillet. When the skillet is full, place the lid on and cook for about 5 minutes. Take the lid off, and turn all the pieces of chicken over. Replace the lid. Cook another 5 minutes. Remove the lid, turn the chicken again, and cook another minutes without the lid. It takes about 20-25 minutes to cook the chicken.

I served mine with homemade gluten free macaroni and cheese and green beans.

Chicken With Salsa and Rice

This dinner is so quick, easy, inexpensive and good--all the best reasons in the world to try it. I'm telling ya, it does not get any better than this.

Chicken with Salsa and Rice:

6 pieces of chicken, skin removed
3 tablespoons olive oil
salt and pepper
1 jar of your favorite salsa
1 jar of water
1 cup of uncooked rice

Heat the olive oil in a large skillet. Salt and pepper the chicken pieces and brown them in the olive oil. Pour in the jar of salsa, the water, and the rice. Stir to distribute the rice in the pan. Cover and simmer until the rice is done, about 22 minutes.

I made this tonight with an Apple Salsa from a farm market in Pennsylvania. Side dishes were black beans and pear salad. How simple is that?

Chicken Corn Chowder

I found a really good deal on chicken the other day—only 89 cents a pound for leg and thigh quarters. The only catch was that you had to buy 10 pounds of it to get that price. Those of you who know me know that I live in a tiny little travel trailer and have a tiny little freezer. That 10 pounds of chicken just about filled up the freezer. So I have been cooking chicken just about every day for the last week. In order to not have the same old thing day in and day out, I have been trying new things. The chicken of the day for today may be the most yummy thing made with chicken, EVER! If you have a gluten freedie that you feed, or even if you don’t this should be on your menu soon. It tastes like love in a bowl.

Chicken and Corn Chowder

2 cups cooked chicken, diced
6 cups chicken broth
2 tablespoons butter
1 onion, diced
1 celery rib, diced
3 shallots, diced
salt and pepper to taste
2 medium potatoes, peeled and diced
1 ½ cups frozen creamed corn or 3 ears fresh, scraped off the cob
2 oz evaporated milk
¼ cup sour cream
1-3 tablespoons potato flour (or regular wheat flour if you are not gluten free)

Put the chicken, broth, corn and potatoes in a dutch oven and bring to a boil. Turn the heat down and simmer for 30 minutes or until the potatoes are soft. In the meantime, melt the butter in a skillet. Add the onion, celery, and shallots and saute until the onions are translucent. Add the onion mixture to the dutch oven. When potatoes are done, add the evaporated milk and sour cream. Add flour and stir until desired thickness is achieved.

This is very good served with buttered gluten free bread or cheese toast.

For an interesting variation, add a couple of roasted, diced poblano peppers with the onions. Yuummmm!

Hacienda Shiloh

Have you ever been to a wine tasting? I have too. But, have you ever been to a garlic tasting? I had not until today.

One of the girls I work with at Granite Hill Camping Resort told me about a place nearby called Hacienda Shiloh. It is an herb farm near Gettysburg. They have 23 different kinds of garlic there. Jim and I drove over there today after breakfast. The short drive to get there was a treat in itself, a twisty mountain road through the forest, where we had to slow down to keep from hitting a huge deer that lept across the road in front of us.

At Hacienda Shiloh, there is a gift shop, the garlic barn, a greenhouse, and of course, the gardens. They have flowers and herbs growing everywhere. Of course it wasn’t as beautiful as it could be because we have been in a drought here, but still, it was fabulous.

Our first stop was the gift shop. They have tons of dried herbs for both medicinal and culinary uses. Garlic jelly, garlic powder, minced garlic, garlic pesto, garlic granules, garlic cookbooks, and garlic utensils. If is has to do with garlic, you can get it there. After we looked around in the gift shop, we walked down past the vegetable garden to the garlic barn, where they had all the different kinds of garlic hanging up to dry. The nice lady (I can not remember her name, dang it) broke off cloves of several different kinds for us to taste. We both liked the Italian garlic best, so we bought a bunch of it.

We also got some garlic scapes, which are the tiny little bulblets from the flower that grows out the top of a garlic plant. I had never even seen anything like them before. She said you take them home and pinch them off of the flower heads, and store them in a zip lock bag in the refrigerator. Sprinkle a few in a salad for a burst of garlic flavor. Yum!

As we were walking back to the gift shop to pay for our purchases, I happened to see some chard growing in her vegetable garden. I asked her if she would sell me some of it, and of course she did. She got our her scissors and cut me a handful of it, both red and green. As she was cutting it she told me she has fresh herbs, too. So, I got her to cut me some fresh basil, my favorite herb.

Back in the gift shop, I rounded out my purchase with a Autumn Cranberry Rub and some Mushroom Sea Salt. The Autumn Cranberry Rub has cranberries, orange zest, rosemary and sea salt. She recommended rubbing it on chicken or fish. The Mushroom Sea Salt has powdered oyster, boletes, porcini, shitake, and woodear mushrooms. I can not wait to try it. The last thing I picked out was four sample sizes of herbal teas. All of the things I bought came to $16.10. What a deal! Oh, I forgot about the little bag of shallots, too.

When I got home with all this stuff, here is what I made for dinner:

1 chicken breast, skinned, deboned, and cut into bite size pieces
20-25 cloves of garlic (I sliced some and left some whole)
2 shallots, diced
1 bunch of chard, washed, and cut up (I cut up some of the more tender stems, too)
olive oil
salt and pepper to taste

Heat the olive oil in a skillet. Add the garlic and shallots, and sautee until tender. Add the chicken and stir fry until the chicken is done. Meantime, steam the chard in the microwave for about three minutes. When the chicken is done, add in the chard and sautee about 2 minutes. Serve over gluten free spaghetti or angel hair pasta.

I usually make this with broccoli, but since I had the chard, I used it instead. Oh MY God! Delish!

The lady at Hacienda Shiloh said she will ship anywhere in the country. She is working on getting a website. If you would like to have her product and price list, write to her at:

Hacienda Shiloh
327 Knox Road
Gettysburg, PA 17325-7243

Or send her an email at casagarlic @ superpa.net.