Chicken with Cilantro and Lime

1 whole chicken, 4-5 pounds
or 6-8 drumsticks, breasts, or thighs

Marinade:
1/2 cup fresh lime juice
1/4 cup olive oil
1 tbsp minced garlic
2 tsp onion powder or 1 tbsp grated onion
2 tbsp cilantro
1/2 tsp ground chile pepper

If roasting a whole chicken, remove giblets. Rinse chicken inside and out with warm water. Tie chicken with kitchen string if you will be cooking it on the rotisserie.

Mix marinade ingredients in large ziploc bag. Put chicken or pieces in bag and marinate 6-8 hours in refrigerator.

Preheat oven to 450. Roast about 15-20 minutes per pound. When done, temperature should be 180 (170 for breasts, thighs, or drumsticks).

Let stand 10 minutes before cutting.

Holiday Relish

aka Cranberry Sauce

12 oz fresh, frozen, or canned cranberries
1 large apple, peeled, cored, and coarsely chopped
1 orange, peeled and chopped
1 tbsp grated orange rind
1/2 cup red wine
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 tsp cinnamon

Put all the ingredients in a heavy-bottomed saucepan and stir to combine. Keep stirring and bring the ingredients to a boil over medium heat. Lower the heat and simmer gently until relish thickens, about 5 minutes. Remove from heat and cool to room temperature. Garnish with orange rind curls.

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The recipe I was following is from Parade, but I made a few changes, some of which I can't remember, but I think I hit most of them. Judging by the picture at parade.com, the original recipe does produce something more like relish than sauce. Adding some wine (mulled wine if possible) makes it more liquid and adds a rich flavor. Based on what was in our mulled wine, one could probably add cloves and allspice to this sauce, or just add it to the wine and enjoy that while cooking for the holidays! (It does wonderful things to pot roast as well.)

Chicken Salad part 2

Mom says the bag of m&ms has to go. Being a good daughter, that means I must eat them. Summer diets are silly anyway.

Turns out the gazpacho was really good with chicken and flatbread. Also I realized today that the fruit salad is best eaten the day it's made, or the grapes start turning red and the strawberries get soggy. I think I can handle that.

Lunch tomorrow is chicken salad with pecans walnuts, celery, red and green apples, and fried egg yolks. It's very colorful. I'm trying to think of what else is yellow that I could add...I don't think I want corn in my chicken salad, maybe summer squash or I wonder how plantains would taste?? It should be something crunchy I think. Yellow apples, perhaps. Red grapes and green and/or yellow apples. Drew suggests baked corn tortilla strips (sprinkle with oil and bake at 300° until crispy - I got some tortillas to try this with sometime soon. And glazed nasturtiums. o.O Any other ideas welcome.

I have a rather large amount of this salad, so (also per Drew's suggestion) after sandwiches tomorrow, I'll try it out over a fruity mix, with some combination of grapes, cantaloupe, strawberries, and maybe I'll go get a pineapple. I wonder if I should mix in some kind of herb with it...what would be good with chicken, mayo, and fruit? Elise.com says tarragon (along with cranberries). I'm tempted to add some mint just for kicks.

Garden Gazpacho

Makes 4 servings

2 lbs large ripe tomatoes, seeded, and diced
1/2 orange bell pepper, diced
1/2 green bell pepper, diced
1 cucumber, peeled, seeded, and diced
2 tbs red wine vinegar
2 tbs mild çayenne pepper sauce
1 tbs extra virgin olive oil
1 garlic clove, crushed
1/2 tsp coarse salt
1 c vegetable juice
3/4 c fresh corn kernels
2 green onions, chopped
2 tbs thinly sliced fresh basil

Put half the tomatoes, peppers, and cucumber as well as all of the vinegar, pepper sauce, oil, garlic, and salt in a blender. Purée until smooth and transfer to a large glass bowl or container. Stir in the remaining tomatoes, peppers, cucumber, vegetable juice, corn, and green onions. Cover and refrigerate until the flavors are blended, at least four hours. Continue to check flavors periodically as soup chills. Ladle the soup into chilled bowls and sprinkle with basil.

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This recipe is actually a Glad advertisement in issue 43 of Everyday Food that I picked up in the South Bend airport. It's not too hard to make, evidenced by the fact that I managed to make it without having a clue how to dice tomatoes or use the food processor or anything. I hard boiled some eggs to go with it (it's for lunch tomorrow) and managed to crack most of them. *sigh* On the daily cooking scale, today might be about a 5. But at least lunch will be tasty if nothing else.

P.S. This is the beginning of my make-my-parents-lunch-every-day phase, as it is summer. This means I'll be updating a lot more and hopefully learning something in the process. My parents are my test-tasters, so I'm hoping they can give me some feedback such as MAKE IT AGAIN PLEASE or ....maybe let's have that other thing again. =)