Finishing Up The New Year's Celebrations! Part 2!

It's still a new year, so Happy New Year again, Friends!  Now I'm going to share with you some of the great food we had for New Year's Eve and New Year's Day, while listening to and watching the college football playoff games!

Apple Pie Cookies!

These Apple Pie Cookies were beautiful and tasty and the kitchen smelled like Fall again!  If you want the cookies to look like the picture on the original recipe, you need to dice those apples a lot smaller than I did and use smaller scoops of the apple mixture to make the cookies!  Click on the picture above for the recipe and a video.  Easy and delicious!  Great with vanilla ice cream, too, but we were too full for that!

Korean Style Hot Wings! My Favorite!

I have been wanting to make these forever! I've never made chicken wings except frozen, fully cooked ones from Sam's.  I am sure now I will make them over and over again!  I saved some money by buying fresh chicken wings and sectioning them myself.

Kim, a friend from culinary school, introduced me to Gochujang, a Korean red pepper paste.  It is spicy and delicious.  Click on the picture above for the recipe.  As you can see from the picture of the recipe, I forgot to toast and use the sesame seeds.  I think I was in too much of a hurry to eat the wings, or sometimes I just forget things! 

The cucumbers are drizzled in sesame oil and kosher salt.  I want some right now!  The texture on these wings is perfect; they have just enough bite on the outside and they're moist and tender on the inside, and they're baked!  It was all a big hit with the family!

Our White Sauce and Salsa Version of Chicken Enchiladas!

Here is one of my lifetime favorites, Mexican food!  The first picture is of diced onions, just because they're in almost every savory dish I cook.  The third picture is of the ingredients used in the guacamole.  I forgot to take a picture of the guacamole, because I forget things (I think I said that already), and it had diced onion in it, also.  My Cousin Jeff liked the guacamole and he usually doesn't!  It had avocados, diced grape tomatoes (the best looking ones in the store right now), finely diced jalapeno, lime juice,  and chopped cilantro.  If you're not going to serve the guacamole right away, make sure you have added the citrus juice.  Press Saran Wrap directly onto the guacamole when covering the bowl and refrigerate.  It might turn a little brown anyway, but if it does, just stir it up, it'll be back to it's bright green again!

These enchiladas are considered "Mexican restaurant style" rather than authentic Mexican.

Here's what I used to make the enchiladas:

• Flour tortillas
• Refried black beans
• Shredded Chicken (recipe below, includes onions and peppers)
• Salsa (if you have to have a jar salsa, we all like On The Border brand)
• Mexican restaurant style cheese dip (White American cheese)
• Green onions, diced for garnish

I used flour tortillas in the above recipe, but my sister and I like a tortilla found at Publix that is a combination of corn and flour.  I am very, very picky regarding salsa and I prefer homemade, but I will admit, I have not mastered that yet.  It's just hit and miss.  So I was happy to find one I could purchase that I like a lot (not counting the salsa from my favorite Mexican restaurant, Los Portales).  My friend Kendall introduced me to this.  Then I covered the enchiladas with white cheese dip, which is American, but we love it very much!  Then I sprinkled chopped green onions on top to make it even prettier!

Now, let me tell you about the shredded chicken filling!  This is a recipe that is made in the Crock Pot, and is great for freezing!  Then you just pull it out to make many delicious dishes, such as soup, chili, enchiladas, tacos, sandwiches, and the list goes on and on!    Here's how to do it!

Take 3 - 4 pounds of chicken breasts, season all over with salt, pepper, and garlic powder.  Place it in a Crock Pot, add small diced onions and peppers, and cover with low sodium chicken broth.  Cook on low for 6 - 8 hours.  If you want to cook it faster, cook on high for 3 - 4 hours.   When it's done, place the chicken on a cutting board and shred it with two forks.  The sooner you shred it while the chicken is still hot, the easier it is to shred!

My Cousin Amy came in and helped me assemble the enchiladas, and my sister Janise, was helpful in making the Sangria.  It is nice to have help in the kitchen when you're trying to do several things, especially in the cleaning up!   So, first lightly spray a glass baking dish with cooking spray; lay out the tortilla and spread refried beans down the middle.  (If using canned refried beans, heat them up on the stove with a little water first, just a little bit of water; this will make them smooth and easy to spread. )  Then top the beans with the shredded chicken.  Fold the tortilla over the beans and chicken and then roll the tortilla.  Place it in the greased baking pan with the seam down.  Top with salsa and cheese dip and bake for about 20 minutes at 350 degrees.  Sprinkle with diced green onions for garnish.  These were also a big hit! 

Winter Sangria!

I made a Sangria a few months ago for a friend.  That recipe is on an earlier post, and you can find it by using the new search feature at the top right of this page!  My sister requested Sangria for our little New Year's Eve gathering, so I decided to "winterize" it!  We still had several bottles of wine from our friend June's collection, so I gathered two bottles of merlot, a bottle of Applewine, and a bottle of sparkling wine (you can use champagne, or even sparkling water if you want to)!  I then bought some red pears, some Asian pears when I thought I couldn't find red pears, and diced them all up.  They taste so good!  I wanted blood oranges, because they are pretty and they are supposed to be available in December, but had to use regular navel oranges, and I sliced those.  I had Granny Smith apples in the house which I wish I had remembered to use, but I didn't.  Mix it all up, except for the sparkling beverage, and let it sit in the refrigerator for a few hours or overnight.  Before you're ready to serve, add the sparkling wine!  Beautiful and delicious!

As you can see, these was no measuring in this recipe.  Just take what you like and mix it up!

Savory Sausage & Cheddar Bread Pudding!

Because we were going to be staying up late with friends, I made a breakfast  bread pudding for the next morning that I put in the fridge and it was ready to pop in the oven!  I went ahead and cooked it on New Year's Eve so Jeff and Amy could take half of it home with them for their breakfast the next morning.  I love breakfast!  This has butter, ground, hot sausage, eggs, cheese, onion, half & half, bread, and a little parsley for freshness, everything you need for breakfast except for the coffee!  Click on the picture above for the recipe!

The South's Traditional New Year's Day Meal!

Now for the finale! Southern cornbread, collard greens, black-eyed peas in the Crock Pot, and spiral sliced Honey Baked Ham that was a Christmas present from one of my sister's clients!  See previous posts of these by using the search feature (I love that thing)! 

I really love collard greens!  I made them to accompany Veal Scallopini in a practical I had in culinary school!  If you ever go to culinary school, don't make collard greens with Veal Scallopini, especially if your instructor is from Chicago.  I should have used an "Italian" vegetable.  I guess they don't have greens in Italy.  The only thing I did differently with the greens and peas recipes is that I don't use ham hocks or pork in them.  Most of the time I am a food "purist" (I learned that from Michael Symon), so most of the time I'm happy with just salt, pepper, onions, and garlic!

The black eyed peas were cooked in the Crock Pot with low sodium chicken broth (always on hand), salt, pepper, garlic, bell pepper and onion.  Cover the peas with the broth by about two inches and cook on low all day!

Whew, Friends, this post was lengthier than the rest of them, but you know, it was the holidays and there was LOTS going on.  I enjoyed every minute of it.  I love prepping and cooking the food, but my favorite part is watching friends and family enjoy eating it!  It's almost the middle of January now, and I'll be looking for healthier, delicious recipes to share to get back on a healthy eating track!

I would love to have your comments and feedback on the blog and on the different recipes! 

Until next time, Denise, @ Dished With Love!