Chopped Challenge #13: Macaroni & Cheese Pot Pie

Well, it seems that I have misplaced/lost/accidentally deleted the photos for Chopped challenges #11 and 12. :( I'm usually so careful about my photos, but I seem to be missing the pictures for those two challenges and a couple other recipes I planned to post. I think I probably uploaded some of the pictures on the memory card but not all of them, and then when I looked at the card later, I saw those same photos, assumed I had transfered everything on the card already, and deleted everything that was on it. C'est la vie. There's nothing I can do about it now. For the record, for challenge 11, I had to cook with chicken, Italian seasoning, tri-color pasta, and flavored wine. Justin left it up to me to pick the flavor of wine. It could be blueberry, peach, strawberry, etc.--anything that specifically listed a flavor on the label was fine. I decided to go with an orange and peach flavored one and used it to make Orange-Honey Chicken with Asian Pasta Salad. I marinated the chicken in the wine and some of the Italian seasoning, and I also used it along with some honey to make a sauce. I coated the chicken with some panko and baked it until it was done, and then I served it with the sauce drizzled over it. For a side, I combined the tri-color pasta with some diced onion and bell pepper, as well as some Asian sesame dressing to make pasta salad. It was pretty good. I think the pasta salad was my favorite part.

For challenge 12, Justin had to use cream cheese, king cake-flavored vodka, chai powder, and frozen waffles. He turned that into Boozy Ice Cream with Chai Topping and Waffle Chips. He used the vodka in some ice cream, like in the Boozy Wedding Cake Ice Cream recipe, and he combined the cream cheese with some pudding mix and the chai powder to make a topping with a consistency that was somewhere between pudding and mousse. Just before serving, he toasted the waffles and cut them into quarters to use for dipping into the dessert. It was tasty, and the mixture of the warm waffles with the cold ice cream was really nice.

That's enough about those though. On to today's challenge! Justin gave me boxed macaroni and cheese, ranch seasoning, pork sausage patties, and frozen broccoli to use. I combined those to make a macaroni and cheese pot pie. In the end, I think it could've been a little saucier--it was definitely more on the dry side--but otherwise the flavors were good. You could just make an extra 1/2 recipe of the sauce (minus the extra cheese) or even just add a bit more milk so that it thins out a bit, and that would probably take care of it. If you like your sauce on the thicker side though, try it as is.

Chopped Challenge #10: Choripollo Flatbread Sandwiches

For our tenth Chopped challenge I gave Justin Pillsbury pizza dough, chorizo, chives, and mashed potato flakes. One of our favorite Mexican restaurants near our last apartment in Indiana had choripollo on their menu, which was a mixture of chicken, chorizo, and cheese sauce. It was really delicious, and you just tossed it onto a tortilla with rice, beans, etc. or inhaled it straight from the plate. Originally Justin was going to attempt to make some sort of choripollo empanadas, but he ended up just turning his idea into more of a sandwich instead, using the pizza dough as the bread and putting the cheese sauce on the side for dipping. The flavor was really good, and I would definitely have him make these for dinner again sometime.

Chopped Challenge #9: Steak Chili-Smothered Tater Tots

For Chopped challenge #9, Justin gave me tater tots, chili powder, pearl onions, and beef jerky. I decided to make a steak chili served over tater tots. It was really quite tasty, and I think it's something I would definitely make again sometime, though I could really take or leave the beef jerky. It's used here sort of like bacon bits and would be wholly unnecessary if it hadn't been one of my required ingredients. It tastes good, but it just really wasn't needed.

Chopped Challenge #8: Pulled Pork Sliders with Macaroni and Cheese

Even though I wasn't writing any blog posts during the holidays, Justin and I were still trucking along with our Chopped challenges. Over the next week or two, I'll try to catch up on the posts for the ones we did during that time. We'll start with my challenge to Justin to use Hawaiian sweet bread (one of my favorite foods), steak sauce, mushrooms, and condensed cheese soup.

Chopped Challenge #6: Pierogies & Bacon-Wrapped Meatballs

For Chopped challenge #6, I gave Justin pierogies, turkey bacon, chicken bouillon, and beer. He likes to drink beer but isn't a huge fan of cooking with beer--he'll eat some stuff but can be pretty picky about it. I know that cooking with it was a bit of challenge for him then because he didn't want to do anything that would end up having a strong beer flavor. He decided to boil the pierogies in a mixture of beer and chicken bouillon and then fry them to brown them a little bit. Along with that, he made some homemade meatballs and wrapped them in the turkey bacon before baking them. He said that it wasn't the most elegant dish, but it was still pretty tasty. I especially enjoyed the meatballs. If you like a stronger beer flavor, feel free to cut down on the water or add another beer--these only have a mild hint of beer-ness to them. (Beer-ness is a word, right?)

Chopped Challenge #5, Part 2: White Cheddar Bread Pudding

When I worked at the coffee shop, my boss would always talk about taking the leftover croissants and making a savory bread pudding with them. He never did. He'd make chocolate bread pudding but never a savory one. Going into this challenge, I knew because of that that savory bread pudding was a thing, but I'd never actually had it. (I'd never even had normal, dessert bread pudding until I made this one for Thanksgiving last year.) I knew that this is what I wanted to try to make though, but I wasn't sure how it would come out.

Now that I've made it, I think it might be one of my new favorite things. Justin seemed a little weirded out by it because he said that the texture reminded him a little bit of quiche. (He doesn't like the texture of baked eggs at all, which is really sad because I love quiche.) That being said, he still ate it, so I guess that's something. I, however, can't wait to make this again. It was fluffy and flavorful and filled with cheese & garlic goodness. I might have to try to adapt it into a dinner recipe of its own. Throw in some more veggies and some meat and see where it takes me.

Chopped Challenge #5, Part 1: Coffee-Crusted Pork Loin

This time around, my ingredients for the Chopped challenge were pork, bourbon, Texas toast, and coffee. Something about those ingredients just clicked for me, and it took me all of 5 seconds to decide what I'd be making. I was actually really excited about this challenge, too, for whatever reason, so I definitely was looking forward to making it. I have to say, I was not disappointed. So far we've been pretty lucky and haven't made anything really terrible, or even halfway terrible for that matter. I know we're only 5 challenges in, but that's still pretty good.

For this challenge, I decided to make a coffee-crusted pork loin, maple bourbon barbecue sauce, and a savory, white cheddar bread pudding. (I'll discuss the barbecue sauce and bread pudding in separate posts and just stick to the pork loin in this one.) I've never actually made or even had coffee-crusted anything before. I know that it's a thing that a lot of restaurants do it, so I figured it can't be bad, right? I'm glad I gave it a try because it's really easy to do and tastes great. I liked the pork with the crust by itself, but Justin thought it was much better when paired with the barbecue sauce because the coffee crust is a little bitter and the sauce was nice and sweet. I agree that they complimented each other nicely, but I was just fine eating the pork alone as well. It made for a nice change to plain ol' roasted pork.

Chopped Challenge #4: CajuMex Burritos

Last night it was Justin's turn to cook for yet another Chopped challenge. This time I gave him orzo (my favorite type of pasta), mozzarella cheese, andouille sausage, and taco seasoning. He turned those ingredients into a delicious, over-stuffed burrito with both Cajun and Mexican influences--andouille and shrimp provided the Cajun aspect, while the taco seasoning and chorizo covered the Mexican side of things. The combination was really quite yummy. I look forward to making this again sometime, though I might try to lighten it up somehow.

Chopped Challenge #3: Baked Pizza Roll-ups

It's time for Chopped challenge #3, and this time Justin chose gorgonzola cheese, poblano peppers, diced tomatoes (canned), and... wonton wrappers. Yep. Wonton wrappers. Clearly my first thought was to make some sort of wonton, probably fried. Then I thought about cutting the wonton wrappers in to strips, frying them, and using them as a garnish on a soup or someting. The other ingredients were fairly wide open--he didn't choose any kind of meat, so I could do almost whatever I wanted with the other three ingredients.

I started thinking about what to do with the gorgonzola, and my first thought was pizza. That's pretty much the only way I've ever had gorgonzola before. If I did something pizza-related, I could also use the tomatoes. Wontons often have some kind of pork filling, so I decided to pick up some sausage and go for a sausage pizza kind of filling. I could just toss the poblanos in there and call it done, but I thought it would be nice if there was a dipping sauce to go with the wontons. I settled on a modified version of my easy Alfredo sauce with a poblano twist.

Chopped Challenge #2, Part 2: Fried Leek Biscuits

*I'm splitting this post into two parts, one each for the entree and the side dish.

To compliment the turkey and dumplings that Justin made for Chopped Challenge #2, he also made fried leek biscuits. You could really do this with whatever you wanted to fry. You could fry up some jalapenos and make spicy biscuits. You could fry up some apples and cinnamon and make dessert biscuits. You could fry up some bacon and make--be right back, I've got bacon biscuits to make...

Chopped Challenge #2, Part 1: Turkey and Dumplings

*I'm splitting this post into two parts, one each for the entree and the side dish.

For Justin's first turn cooking for our Chopped challenges, I gave him ground turkey, condensed cream of chicken soup, refrigerated biscuits in a can, and leeks. It's not a terribly difficult, off-the-wall set of ingredients, but I figured he could come up with something fun to do with them. I wasn't wrong.

Chopped Challenge #1: Sausage & Herbed Polenta Cakes with Citrus-Tequila Rosé Sauce

Justin and I spent a lot of time watching Chopped on Food Network when we were living in Indiana. At some point, we decided that we should give it a try ourselves, but we never actually got around to it for whatever reason. We thought about it again recently and decided to actually try it this time. Our plan is to alternate who cooks and to do this once per grocery list (every two weeks or so).

For the challenge, one of us selects four ingredients that the other must use to cook dinner. We can use whatever other ingredients we want, and because right now we're telling the cook what the ingredients will be when we're making our grocery list, we can buy whatever extra supplies we need while we're at the store. (We don't have a lot of pantry space here, so we don't have a ton of extra, basic ingredients on hand usually.) The only two guidelines we really set up are that the four ingredients all have to be something we both eat--I can't make him cook with peas, and he can't make me cook with pumpkin--and they can't all four be super calorific, meaning we can't pick butter, bacon, heavy cream, and maple syrup. Lol.