In the past I’ve subscribed to EatingWell Magazine and always enjoyed their healthy, delicious recipes. I still have all of the magazines. They’re so nicely done I didn’t want to rip out pages for the recipes I wanted to keep. One of the things I enjoy about them is their beautiful photos. Instead I keep the entire magazine and scan the recipes I use.
I was looking for some new ways to make chicken and remembered that EatingWell has a cookbook filled with some of their best creations. I borrowed a copy and found a few recipes I wanted to try. Last week I made the Rosemary Orange Chicken.
I’m going to rave about this recipe for several reasons. First, it was delicious, but also the instructions were so good I was able to make it perfect on the first try. Also, it used healthy ingredients that were readily available. The book lists the time to prepare and cook this meal as 30 minutes. It took me a little longer but I was moving slowly to make sure I got it right. I served it with a salad, steamed broccoli and a glass of Pinot Grigio.
Ingredients:
4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (1½ pounds)
¼ cup all-purpose flour
½ teaspoon salt, divided
¼ teaspoon freshly ground pepper
3 teaspoons extra virgin olive oil, divided
¼ cup finely chopped shallots
1 clove garlic, minced
¾ cup fresh orange juice
½ cup reduced-sodium chicken broth
1 teaspoon butter
1 teaspoon chopped fresh rosemary
½ teaspoon white wine vinegar
Preparation:
- Chop shallots and mince garlic; set aside. Pound chicken breasts to ½ inch. Combine flour, ¼ teaspoon salt and pepper in a shallow dish. Dredge the chicken, shaking off excess. Heat 1½ teaspoons oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the chicken and cook until well browned and no longer pink in the center, about 3 to 5 minutes per side. Transfer to a plate and keep warm.
- Whisk the orange juice and chicken broth in a measuring cup. Add the remaining 1½ teaspoons oil to the pan. Add shallots and garlic and cook, stirring, for 1 minute. Add the orange juice and chicken broth. Simmer 3 to 5 minutes until slightly thickened.
- Return chicken and juices to the pan. Simmer until heated through, 1 to 2 minutes. Transfer the chicken to a serving platter. Stir butter, rosemary and white-wine vinegar into the sauce; add ¼ teaspoon salt and pepper to taste. Spoon sauce over the chicken.
I had a left over piece that I used the next day in a Caesar Chicken Salad. I warmed it to room temperature, sliced it up and tossed it on the salad. Delicious!
This was so good that I’m going to try another chicken creation this weekend. Either Scallion & Ginger Spiced Chicken or Lemon & Dill Chicken.
Weekend Cooking is hosted by Beth Fish Reads. Participation is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, fabulous quotations, photographs.
When I went out to refill the bird feeders this evening I startled a large bird rummaging in the wood chips near the fence. It was a Northern Flicker and it blended in so well I didn’t even notice it was there until it flew up into the pine tree. I don’t see Flickers in my yard that often, maybe a few times a year. I ran in the house and grabbed my camera.
The northern flicker is a medium-sized brown woodpecker patterned with black spots and bars and a black crescent on the breast. They have a white rump patch that’s visible in flight and sometimes when perched. There is also a flash of color in the wings visible in flight – yellow in eastern birds and red in the western residents. (Click on the photo to the left to see the yellow in the wing).
Unlike most woodpeckers, which are usually found climbing the large branches of old trees, it’s not unusual to find a Flicker on the ground digging for bugs.
Soon a pair of Flickers reappeared in the yard. In the photo below the male is on the left and the female is on the right. The male is identified by the black moustache stripes which are absent in the female.
After a few minutes of sitting on my garden shed they decided it was a good place to do a little mating. Yup, they did. Look close and you can see he’s standing on her back. Most likely they have a nest in a nearby yard which is exciting because that means baby Flickers in a few months.
Interesting Facts:
- Flickers prefer to find food on the ground using their long barbed tongue to lap up ants, a favorite.
- The Flicker is one of the few North American Woodpeckers that is migratory.
- Flickers nest in cavities in trees and both the male and female incubate the eggs.
I link up my bird photos on Saturday Snapshot hosted by Alyce at At Home With Books. Visit her blog to see more great photos or add your own.
Mailbox Monday was created by The Printed Page. It is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came into their home last week.
Mailbox Monday is currently on tour, hosted by a different blog each month. This month’s host is Amy @ Passages To The Past.
Two books from LibraryThing for review:
Wings: A Novel of WWII Flygirls
by Karl Friedrich
Based on the true World War II stories of America’s first female military pilots, this historic novel follows the story of a young woman from a dirt-poor farm family. Sally Ketchum has little chance of bettering her life until a mysterious barnstormer named Tex teaches her to fly and to dare to love. But when Tex dies in a freak accident, Sally must make her own way in the world.
Mr. Chartwell
by Rebecca Hunt
July 1964. Chartwell House, Kent: Winston Churchill wakes at dawn. There’s a dark, mute “presence” in the room that focuses on him with rapt concentration.
It’s Mr. Chartwell.
In this utterly original, moving, funny, and exuberant novel, Rebecca Hunt explores how two unlikely lives collide as Mr. Chartwell’s motives are revealed to be far darker and deeper than they at first seem.
From Doubleday for review:
Robopocalypse
by Daniel H. Wilson
When the Robot War ignites — at a moment known later as Zero Hour — humankind will be both decimated and, possibly, for the first time in history, united. Robopocalypse is a brilliantly conceived action-filled epic, a terrifying story with heart-stopping implications for the real technology all around us…and an entertaining and engaging thriller unlike anything else written in years.
A win from Random House:
Every Last One
by Anna Quindlen
Mary Beth Latham has built her life around her family, around caring for her three teenage children and preserving the rituals of their daily life. When one of her sons becomes depressed, Mary Beth focuses on him, only to be blindsided by a shocking act of violence. What happens afterward is a testament to the power of a woman’s love and determination, and to the invisible lines of hope and healing that connect one human being to another.
The Bird Sisters
by Rebecca Rasmussen
Genre: Historical Fiction, Literature
Publisher: Crown Books
Publish Date: April 12, 2011
Format: Hardcover | 304 pages
Rating: 5 of 5
Milly and Twiss are spinster sisters living in the small town of Spring Green, Wisconsin, in the same house where they grew up. They spent their lives mending birds and the hearts of others, but they could not do the same for themselves. As young girls this was not the way they imagined their lives would end. Milly wanted to marry and have a family; Twiss wanted to travel and see the world, but that was not to be. One fateful summer in 1947 the course of history was set for the sisters, and they could not change their destiny any more than they could stop the sun from rising each morning.
Most of the story takes place in 1947. It is told from the present in short chapters alternating with longer chapters in the past. I like this technique as it reinforces the perspective of the sisters as elderly women who have lived their lives and are reflecting back on the past. We know the end and now, layer by layer, the events of that summer are revealed. The accident that cost their father his job as a golf-pro, their priest who ran off to Mexico and cousin Bett who came to visit and turned their world upside down.
I didn’t realize what a beautiful and heartbreaking story this would be. In their own way the sisters are as damaged as the birds they try to heal. The characters were beautifully drawn and the vivid descriptions of Spring Green made the town come to life. Although I live in a suburb, I am a small town girl at heart and delighted in the picturesque scenes of nature. Rebecca Rasmussen writes with a wisdom and grace far beyond her years.
I had been eagerly anticipating the arrival of my copy of The Bird Sisters for months. When it finally arrived I gazed at the beautiful glossy cover with it’s lovely birds and placed it on the top of my stack of books. I finished it last week and although I’ve moved on to read a few other books, I’m still thinking about it, digesting it and enjoying it in my mind.
My favorite character was Twiss and not just because she was ‘the bird lady’. I could relate to her on multiple levels. Like me, she wanted to be an explorer or scientist, but never did; she helped birds instead. She didn’t approve of Mrs. Bettle keeping her parrot in a cage; birds should be free. She never did get to travel and see the Continental Divide, “her memories were her suitcase, and her mind her passport”. She has empathy for both birds and people. She chose the lacy dress to please Adele, “who like every other childless woman in Spring Green had probably always wanted to dress a little girl”, and said “It’s like happiness can be sewn”. Twiss appears to have accepted her life and her choices.
This is a wonderful book that has something for everyone. A great selection for readers young and old. Highly recommended and one of my favorites this year.
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Visit Rebecca Rasmussen at her blog, The Bird Sisters.
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Source: Copy provide by the publisher for review.
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I’m participating in Book Review Party Wednesday. Click the link to read more great reviews.
Cassandra at Indie Reader Houston hosts 5 Best Books, a weekly meme that asks participants to list what they consider the 5 best books on a given topic.
This week’s topic is 5 Best Books … About Nature or the Environment.
I could easily choose more than five books on this topic. I’m a gardener, nature lover and bird watcher so I read a lot of non-fiction about the environment plus I enjoy books where nature plays a role. In honor of Earth Day I chose to go with four books about the planet and one novel that I just finished where nature and birds were an integral part of the plot and richly woven into the story.
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle
by Barbara Kingsolver
Part memoir and part commentary on the American food industry, the book chronicled the family’s journey though one year of eating only foods that could be obtained regionally. They planted and harvested their own crops, canned and stored food for the winter and raised poultry on their farm. For obvious reasons this lifestyle is not for everyone, but reading about their experience makes you think about where your food comes from, how commercial farming affects the planet and what little things we can each do that will make a big difference.
The World Without Us
by Alan Weisman
What would happen if, overnight, humans disappeared from the planet? The books describes what happens after 5 minutes, an hour, a day, a year, five years, 10 years, 100 years. Absolutely fascinating speculation of how the earth would heal itself once there are no longer people to pollute the planet and destroy habitats. As real examples, there are areas of the planet that have, for various reasons, remained untouched for a number of years and show evidence of the earth healing. There is also a television series based on this book called After People. Using CGI they demonstrate visually what will happen to current day structures in hundreds of years. One of my all time favorites.
The Story of Stuff
by Annie Leonard
The Story of Stuff is aimed at Americans and our consumer society. It is a wealth of information and knowledge on the hidden costs of consumerism and what we can do to make it better. This is a good reference book with lots of eye-opening facts about how stuff is made, shipped and ultimately disposed of when we are done with it. After reading The Story of Stuff, it’s difficult to look at ‘stuff’ the same way again.The author presents the facts without being preachy and writes in a humorous and engaging style. Ultimately we have to ask ourselves, does buying more and more stuff make us happier?
Earth: A Visitor’s Guide to the Human Race
by Jon Stewart
Aliens have finally discovered Earth long after the human race has gone extinct. Instead of finding humans, they find a deserted planet and a book left for them by Jon Stewart and The Daily Show crew. While not one of my all time favorite books, it was a funny, irreverent, and often sarcastic look at the earth after humans had ceased to exist. It is both humorous and serious and does make you think about what someone from another planet might think of us and our often bad habits.
The Bird Sisters
by Rebecca Rasmussen
My list would not be complete without including the most recent novel I read and greatly enjoyed with a nature setting, The Bird Sisters. The story takes place in rural Spring Green, Wisconsin. The picturesque scenes of nature and vivid descriptions made the town come to life. Birds play a prominent role in the book and I love birds. It’s a beautiful, heartbreaking story about two sisters looking back on a pivotal year in their lives.
The Mallard is one of the most familiar ducks and is found throughout North America and across Eurasia. During breeding season the males are easily spotted by their iridescent dark green heads. The females are brownish all over with mottled streaking of buff, white, and dark brown.
There is a small lake near my house that is home to a friendly group of ducks. I sat down in the grass and waited for them to come out of the water. They are accustomed to people so I was able to get good close-ups.
I took these pictures at the end of summer so both males and females had non-breeding plumage and were the same brownish color. The way to tell them apart is their bill: males have a yellow bill and female’s have orange with black. The picture above is a female and is one of my favorite shots.
Above is another shot of a female; she had just climbed out of the water. Below is a male, identified by the yellow bill.
Interesting facts (from All About Birds):
- The Mallard is the ancestor of nearly all domestic duck breeds.
- Mallard pairs are generally monogamous, but paired males may chase a single female and mate with her.
- Mallard pairs form long before the spring breeding season. Pairing takes place in the fall, but courtship can be seen all winter.
- Only the female incubates the eggs and takes care of the ducklings.
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Saturday Snapshots is hosted by Alyce. Head on over to At Home With Books to see more great photos or add your own.
“Waiting On” Wednesday is a weekly event hosted by Jill at Breaking The Spine that spotlights upcoming releases that we’re eagerly anticipating.
I am very excited about this one. Victorian time travel, H.G. Wells, Jack the Ripper; any one of them would have piqued my interest.
The Map of Time
by Félix J. Palma
To be Published: June 2011 by Altria
Translated from the Spanish by Nick Caistor
From Publisher’s Weekly:
Spanish author Palma makes his U.S. debut with the brilliant first in a trilogy, an intriguing thriller that explores the ramifications of time travel in three intersecting narratives. In the opening chapter, set in 1896 England, aristocratic Andrew Harrington plans to take his own life, despondent over the death years earlier of his lover, the last victim of Jack the Ripper. Meanwhile, 21-year-old Claire Haggerty plots to escape her restrictive role as a woman in Victorian society by journeying to the year 2000. A new commercial concern, Murray’s Time Travel, offers such a trip for a hefty fee. Finally, Scotland Yarder Colin Garrett believes that the fatal wound on a murder victim could only have been caused by a weapon from the future. Linking all three stories is H.G. Wells, the author of The Time Machine. Palma brings Wells and other historical figures like Joseph Merrick, the Elephant Man, plausibly to life. Susannah Clarke fans will be delighted.
Under My Apple Tree 