Feeling as poorly as I have been (and still am this morning), grocery shopping has been out of the question. We used up the last of the fresh meat Sunday, and had dinner delivered Monday and Tuesday. Wednesday, I made corned beef hash with well-rinsed canned corned beef, a large fresh potato, a little fresh carrot and celery, and some onion powder -- pretty good, but a dish I have described before.
Last night I wasn't sure what to do. I wasn't up to any fancy cookery and pickings were slim. On the other hand, the idea of another delivery dinner wasn't appealing.
I'd bought a little jar of basil pesto for shelf stock awhile back. It keeps pretty well and it can be a nice change. We have pasta on hand as a matter of routine; it keeps splendidly and sure, it's "just carbs," but it's good fuel when you're hungry. So there was a start. A protein would be nice to add... It turns out that chicken and pesto go well together, and there are number of different approaches to the combination.
Checking the canned meat, we had Spam, corned beef, salmon, tuna and there it was, chicken.* "Swanson Premium White & Dark Chunk Chicken in Water, 9.75 oz," to be exact, which means a good-sized flat can of fairly flavorful (that "white & dark" combo) chicken.
For pasta, we had radiatori,† one of the more interesting and sauce-holding shapes, not to mention the most Art Deco. I cooked it in well-salted water with a dash of "Italian mix" herbs and some of Tam's mixed hot-pepper flakes, and when it was about half-done, I drained the chicken and heated it up over low heat in a small saucepan, adding the pesto once the chicken was warmed through and stirring it well. Pesto separates when stored, so make sure it's thoroughly mixed. I left it on very low heat.
As soon as the pasta was cooked, I drained it (don't rinse pasta, please! A lot of the flavor goes down the drain!) and added the chicken and pesto. Stirred that up, and there was dinner: filling, nice-tasting, and made entirely from shelf-storable ingredients.
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* I was keeping canned meat stocked in the pantry long before the pandemic and protests turning violent, but I have expanded the variety and amount. Most kinds are good for at least a couple of years. It's good to have.
† Pasta shapes are remarkably varied.
BUILDING A 1:1 BALUN
4 years ago
3 comments:
It's a good feeling when you have everything already on hand to make a meal.
Feel better, Bobbie.
Seems like many canned meat products I find are FULL of salt that seems to be very hard on flavor of anything added to them. Any particular ideas/advice/tips on dealing with that or any particular kinds of canned meats that have less of that?
The ways I know to reduce salt content are pretty basic -- draining well, rinsing or even soaking (this works well with canned corned beef, give it a few minutes in a large bowl of cold water and then pour it off) and cooking with raw potato (and other fresh vegetables) all help. It is the saving of canned corned beef when making hash. The old wisdom, "the dose makes the poison" is true here. Canned meat is better used as a flavoring, a contributor to the recipe, rather than the main part of it.
For this entree, I used less salt than usual when cooking the pasta. There's no denying chicken and pesto add up to a fair amount of salt. You can certainly find reduced-salt versions, which would help, and the pasta is majority of the dish, so that helps, too. The herbs in the pesto are most of the flavor and it's not difficult to make at home; it just takes longer. But that would give you control of the amount of salt in it.
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