Balsamic Chicken with Balsamic Pomegranate Sauce

This is a chicken recipe I made today based on my love for balsamic vinegar, marinated chicken, and the amount of flavor this dish has with an incredibly low amount of sodium. The other great thing about this dish is that you can do all the prep work for the marinade in the morning before work (or class) and then come home, saute the chicken quickly, finish it in the oven, and have everything done in less than a half hour. I paired mine with creamy polenta and a summer spinach salad.

Chicken Marinade:
1/2 cup balsamic vinegar
1/3 cup dry sherry
small pinch of salt
1 diced garlic clove
3 medium sized chicken breasts

Chicken:
1/4 cup grape tomatoes
1 large clove diced garlic
1/2 white onion diced
2 portabella mushroom cups sliced in strips
Balsamic Pomegranate Sauce:
1/2 cup balsamic vinegar
1/2 cup dry sherry
1 tablespoon pomegranate juice

For the chicken, place all of the ingredients in a plastic bag and let marinate for at least 2 hours. Once you're ready to prepare dinner, pre-heat the oven to 375 and then place all of the ingredients for the sauce in a sauce pot and then over medium heat, bring the sauce to a boil and reduce until thick and syrupy (about a half hour).

Once you start that sauce, heat a 10 inch skillet (oven proof) with a tablespoon of olive oil until the oil starts to smoke. Shake the excess liquid and brown each side for about 2 minutes (watch this because the marinade makes it easy to burn).

Then take the skillet off the heat, place the vegetables in the pan around the chicken and put the whole thing in the oven for 12-15 minutes until your thermometer reads 170 degrees.

Then put a little sauce over the chicken and enjoy with your choice of sides.

Strawberries and Creme Cake

This is a cake based on the traditional strawberries and cream cake but I combined a few recipes to make it dairy free. The biggest issue with making this cake dairy free is making a whipped cream frosting. I've done a lot of research trying to find a good and easy way to make a dairy free whipped cream and there are plenty of recipes using tofu or whipped soy milk and vegetable oil, but they all seem a bit off. My decision for this cake was to completely side step that issue and go with a FANTASTIC butter cream frosting. The cake and strawberry recipe is a dairy-free adaptation from the cooks illustrated and the icing is from the Who You Callin' Cupcake cookbook.

Cake:
1 1/4 cup cake flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup sugar
5 eggs (2 whole, 3 separated)
6 tablespoons earth balance butter substitute (I prefer the stick version because it's just easier to use for baking) - melted and cooled slightly
2 tablespoons water
2 teaspoons vanilla

Icing:
1/2 cup vegetable shortening
1/4 cup earth balance butter substitute
2 cups sifted powdered sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla
2 tablespoons soy milk

Strawberry Filling:
2 pounds strawberries
4 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons kirsch


For the cake, pre-heat your oven to 325 and grease and flour a 9" x 2" cake pan and put a greased parchment paper round in the bottom of the pan. In a large mixing bowl whisk together the cake flour, baking powder, salt, and everything but 3 tablespoons sugar. Then, whisk in the eggs, melted and cooled butter substitute, water, and vanilla and whisk until just smooth.

Using the stand mixer with the whisk attachment, whip the egg whites on medium low speed for a minute or so just until the whites become frothy. Then, turn up the speed to medium high and slowly add in the remaining sugar and whip until the egg whites reach the soft peaks. For this step, keep a good eye on the whites because essentially, you'll be finished when you see waves starting to form in the egg whites. Turn off the mixer, give the whites a good whisk or two using the whisk attachment by hand and then add 1/3 of the whites to the batter and stir until smooth (I like using a rubber spatula for this). Then carefully fold in the remaining egg whites.

Bake for between 30-40 minutes. (*Ok - I absolutely hate these broad cooking ranges but I read a great suggestion in Ina Garten's cook book recently that helped. About 28 minutes into the baking, check the cake with a toothpick and if the top is golden and the tooth pick comes out of the cake with no crumbs, then your cake is done. However, mine took about 35 minutes).

When your cake is done, let it cool in the pan for about 20 minutes and then invert it onto a cooling rack and flip it right side up to cool for at least 2 hours. While the cake is cooling, you can work on the other components.

For the strawberries, wash your strawberries and pick through them to find 24 medium sized and nice looking strawberries to set aside for later. Using the remaining less-perfect strawberries, stem them and quarter them and place them in a bowl. Then stir in the 4 tablespoons and of sugar and let it sit for about an hour (stirring it every 15 minutes or so).

When it's done macerating and the strawberries have released about 1/2 cup of juice, strain the strawberries and place them in a food processor and the juice in a small sauce pan with the kirsch. Pulse the berries about 5 - one second pulses and set aside. With the berry juice/kirsch mixture, simmer until it has reduced to about 3 tablespoons and is a thick syrup. Then pour the syrup into the pulsed berries and set aside to cool.

Then for the icing, using your stand mixer and paddle attachment, beat the shortening and butter substitute until it's light and airy on medium high speed. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and then turn down the speed to low and slowly pour in the powdered sugar, vanilla, and finally the soy milk. Scrape down the sides and beat on high for at least 15 minutes. I've found that this makes a nice airy icing that is similar to the whipped cream in it's lightness and is good enough to eat on a spoon (which I certainly do...)

To assemble this cake, divide the cake into three layers. On the bottom layer, use the reserved whole berries, halve them, and line the outside of the cake with the berry halves face down. Then in the middle, pour half of the cooled berry puree and spread to the berry perimeter. Then take 1/3 of the icing an using an offset spatula, spread the icing almost to the very edge. Then place on the next layer and repeat the previous steps. Finally, place on the final layer and ice with the remaining icing and remaining berry halves.

Finally, take a nice sized slice of that cake and enjoy it. It's a wonderful summer desert and relatively low calorie as well.