Category: Fridge Challenge

What’s in my Fridge: Binging With Babish Edition

Hey Friends! This is a very special edition of What’s in my Fridge because it is an answer to one of my most favorite YouTubers challenges! See below video and the rest of this post will make so much more sense!

Also, you should 100% subscribe and follow Babish on all channels, his stuff is amazing!

This was a huge shot of inspiration for me last night! I was exhausted from work yesterday and after seeing this challenge was actually inspired to get up and create what turned out to be an awesome dinner!

I will say that this wasn’t the hardest What’s in my Fridge challenge as far as ingredients to work with because I actually went food shopping this week. The challenge came in creating an edible version of the Car Panini from Family Guy!

I started by breaking down the ingredients and possible replacements:

  • Vienna Sausage – Sausage of any kind
  • Reese’s Cups – Chocolate & Peanut Butter
  • Doritos – Something Cheesy and Crunchy
  • Cadbury Cream Egg – Some sort of white cream
  • Bread – Bread (obvs)

Then I went to the fridge to compare. I had some left over spicy chorizo sausages, I always have peanut butter, I had chocolate chips, baking chocolate and cocoa powder first three ingredients down! For the cheese I pulled out my shredder cheddar and goat cheese. Looking at everything only one thing stood out to me, HOLY MOLY I have to make MOLE!

I have never made mole sauce and haven’t eaten it much either but after a quick google search found out that you can make a really quick and simple mole with chocolate and peanut butter! Two of the hardest ingredients done! Everything else came together from there I figure a goat cheese cream would cool down the spicy sausage and mole and I could just melt the cheddar into little crisps to add another layer to the panini.

Y’all it actually turned out quite tasty, I am happy to share the recipe below & in true Binging with Babish fashion, share my awkward food eating video.

 

The Nacho Panini : #BabishPanini : Car Panini Challenge

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For the Mole

  • 1 Cup Beef Stock hot
  • 1 8oz can of Tomato Paste
  • 2 Tablespoons of Peanut Butter
  • 1/4 Cup Mini Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips
  • 1 Tablespoon Dark Cocoa Powder
  • 1 Teaspoon Garlic Powder
  • 1 Tablespoon Chili Powder
  • 1/2 Teaspoon Ground Cumin
  • 1/2 Teaspoon Ground Cinnamon
  • Salt & Pepper to taste

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To a dry small sauce pan add the spices (chili, garlic, cumin & cinnamon) turn the heat to medium high and toast just until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Add in hot beef stock and tomato paste. Whisk until combined simmer for 1 – 2 minutes. Add in peanut butter cocoa powder and chocolate chips, whisk until melted and smooth, turn heat down to a simmer. Add water as needed to thin to your desired thickness. Simmer for 10 minutes stirring occasionally.

Cheddar Crisps

  • Shredded Mild Cheddar Cheese
  • Cayenne Pepper

Pre-heat oven to 425. Place a small handful of cheddar cheese in six piles on a cookie sheet lined with a silicon mat or parchment paper. Sprinkle just a touch of cayenne pepper on the rounds. Bake the cheese from apprx 5 minutes checking constantly just until all cheese is melted and edges begin to brown. Remove from oven and let cool slightly. Transfer crisps to paper towels to drain excess grease, crisps with get crispy as they sit out of the oven. Once cooled, trim to desired shape!

Goat Cheese Cream

Warning I have no exact measurements for this (sorry!)

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I took half a log of regular goat cheese (about 4 ounces), a splash of milk, about a teaspoon of honey, lots of salt and probably close to 1/4 cup of lime juice and whipped it all together with my hand mixer until it was the consistency that I wanted. I continued to alternately add milk and lime juice to make it into a thick but runny cream.

Assembly

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On a thick piece of bread slather some mole, add your cooked chorizo sausages and another layer of mole, trim your cheese crisps into triangles and place them a top of the sausage, top cheese crisps with goat cheese cream & top with bread. Butter both sides of bread and place into your panini press/george foreman.

Server with your favorite Mexican beer and be sure to tell your friends “This is NACHO panini, you gotta get your own!” before letting that panini join the clean plate club!

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Chicken Pot Pie : What’s in my Fridge

 

 

I have worked 15 consecutive days in the past two weeks, 70 hours in the past week alone, and I still have two days to go before an actual day off. All of this to say that I have not had a single moment to run by the grocery store and do some solid shopping.

This means that I am out of lunch meat, milk, eggs, bread, fresh vegetables and fresh fruit. I am ashamed to say that my husband and I have mostly been grabbing meals on the go this week which, as it turns out, does not do wonders for our wallets or diets.

Regardless, after I got home from work today I had a huge craving for some home cooking! Somehow I mustered up some energy (must have been from my late afternoon iced coffee), rose from the couch and made my way to the fridge.

I opened the fridge, quickly shut it before I became too uninspired, and checked in the freezer.

Sad Fridge

While staring at my packed freezer of mystery meats and vegetables I grabbed a freeze pop, sugar helps me think, I noticed some frozen biscuits on the freezer door. This got me thinking about a recipe I remembered about quick biscuit topped chicken pot pies. Then I remembered the extra pie crust I had in the fridge from when I made Chocolate Chess Pie!

Recipe

I quickly Googled recipes for Chicken Pot Pie and choose the Pillsbury Classic Chicken Pot Pie. This one has simple ingredients and great cooking temps and times. The items I didn’t have were: milk, and onions. I replaced the milk with heavy cream and just left out the onion.

My improvised recipe is below, something to note, I was only cooking for myself and I only had enough left over pie crust to fill one 16 ounce ramekin. This was a large meal for one person and could easily have been split if I had 2 – 8 ounce baking dishes.

 

 

Ingredients

  • 2.5 small frozen/fresh chicken tenderloins
  • 1.5 cups of frozen mixed vegatables, typically carrot, corn, peas (mine also had lima beans and green beans)
  • 1 cup chicken stock, or 1 packet chicken bouillon prepared
  • 1/2 cup heavy cream
  • 2-3 tablespoons flour
  • Pie crust, either homemade or store bought from refridgerator section. I have a small baseball sized ball left over.
  • & the following to taste:
    • Salt
    • Pepper
    • Parsley
    • Garlic Powder
    • Ground Cayenne Pepper
    • Texas Pete
  • & 2 splashes of White Wine Vinegar

Instructions

Pre-heat oven to 425 & butter your baking dish, for me it was a 16 oz ramekin.

In a medium saucepan cover frozen chicken tenderloins with water a place on medium high heat. Boil chicken until just cooked through. Remove and shred chicken, set aside.

While you are waiting for chicken to cook through place frozen vegetables in a bowl covered with hot water from your tap, they will defrost by the time you need them.

This is also a good time to roll out your pie crust and set the crust into your baking dish, making sure to get rid of any air bubbles under the crust. For now leave the over hang.

After your pie crust is ready, your chicken has cooked and vegetables are thawed it is time to assemble the filling. In a medium frying pan melt 2 tablespoons of butter add any seasonings here. Once butter has melted add in flour and whisk, you should create something that looks like a paste. Constatly whisk cooking through flour for 1-2 minutes being careful not to burn it.

Lower temp to medium and slowly add in 1 cup of stock. Whisk to create a thick and smooth sauce, add in heavy cream and let simmer to 1-2 minutes.

Add shredded chicken and drained vegetables, stir to combine and kill the heat.

*IMPORTANT* Taste your filling here, add in any extra splashes of hot sauce or dashes of salt and pepper. Not much is going to change between now and when it comes out of the oven so make sure you like it before you ruin a perfectly good pie crust!

Transfer to filling to your baking dish, I actually ended up with about 3/4 cup of extra sauce at this point, but all of my chicken and vegetable ended up in the dish. Did I mention this was a hearty meal?

Cover your pie with it’s top crust, pinch together the edges, crimping with a fork or folding however your heart desires. Cut an X, slits, or other design to allow the pie to release steam and transfer your pie into the oven.

Cook for 30-40 minutes until the top is golden brown.

I like to brush on some honey on the top crust in the last few minutes of baking just to add a little sweetness and give it a gorgeous color.

Let your pie sit for 5 minutes and don’t burn your mouth when you dig in!

How do you think this Fridge Challenge went? In my book it is Fridge = 0 Joanna = 1.