our carlson life: October 2013

Fall is here (except for the 90 degrees we had yesterday, but it in the evenings it is here:)). So it is time for chili and corn bread. The best kind of cornbread is made with freshly milled corn and wheat. YUMM. This cornbread is light and moist and not too sweet, perfect for chili.

Whole Wheat Cornbread

recipe adapted from foodnetwork.com

Ingredients

1 cup cornmeal (corn kernels)

3/4 cup whole wheat flour (hard wheat berries)

1 Tbsp sugar

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

1 1/2 cup milk plus 4 1/2 tsp lemon juice (or buttermilk)

2 eggs, lightly beaten

6 Tbsp unsalted butter, melted

Directions

Pre-heat the oven to 425F

If you mill your own flour, grind your corn kernels and hard wheat berries. I of course use my WonderMill.

Combine your freshly milled corn meal and whole wheat flour with the rest of the dry ingredients -sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

Since I usually don't have buttermilk on hand and hate to buy it to only use a little bit, I usually make a buttermilk substitute. A very easy substitute is combining milk and lemon juice. For every cup of milk add one tablespoon (or three teaspoons) lemon juice. In this recipe you will add 4 1/2 tsp to 1 1/2 cups milk. Let it sit for a couple of minutes and it is ready to use.

Mix the milk, eggs, and butter together in a separate bowl.

Then fold in the wet mixture into the dry mixture.

Pour the batter into a greased 8x8 baking pan.

Bake the cornbread for about 20-25 minutes.

ENJOY!

I have never made chicken potpie before, but when I came across several recipes that used biscuits as the pie crust, I was intrigued. At first I thought it would be a lot of extra work to have to make the biscuits, but since they bake with the filling, it doesn't really take much time.

Whole Wheat Chicken Potpie

recipe adapted from allyou magazine

Ingredients

Filling

1 onion, chopped

1 bell pepper, seeded and diced

1/2 cup whole wheat flour (wheat berries)

3 cups chicken broth

1 cup milk

1 1/2lb. boneless, skinless chicken thighs, cut into 1" pieces

1 cup frozen peas

3 carrots, sliced

salt and pepper to taste

Topping

2 1/2 cups whole wheat flour (wheat berries)

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

3 Tbsp cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces

2 Tbsp olive oil

1 cup plus 1 Tbsp milk

Directions

Sauté onion and bell pepper in skillet over medium high heat for about 5 minutes.

If you mill your own flour, grind about 2 plus cups of wheat berries. I used my WonderMill.

Add 1/2 cup flour to the sautéed onions and bell pepper and stir for about a minute.

Then stir in the chicken stock and let it boil until the mixture gets thick.

Reduce the heat to medium low and stir in one cup of milk.

Add the chicken and let it cook for about 7 minutes.

Finally stir in the carrots and peas and season with salt and pepper. Pour the mixture into a 2 quart baking dish. Let the mixture rest while making the biscuits.

Pre-heat the oven to 425F.

In a food processor, pulse 2 1/2 cups flour, baking powder and salt together before adding the butter.

Once the butter has been incorporated into the dry ingredients, add the oil and milk, continuing to pulse until a sticky dough is formed.

Remove the dough from the processor and knead the dough before rolling it into half inch thickness.

Use a two inch cookie cutter to form 15 biscuits. I somehow don't have any round cookie cutters?! so I used the mouth of a recycled jar and it worked just fine:)