Stroganoff a strike-it-off?

In hopes of improving El's interest in food and maybe getting her to vary her diet some, we sat down last week and went through one of my cook books looking for things she thought might be good. I was surprised at many of her choices, including a chicken pie with leeks in it because she has refused to even touch my version of chicken pot pit. We'll see how that one plays out in a couple of weeks.
Tonight we had chicken stroganoff, which was a recipe she had picked from the cookbook. Since I tend to use recipes as starting points and not engraved in stone like the ten commandments of cooking, my final result wasn't exactly like the book showed. The biggest difference was that the recipe suggest rice pilaf as a side dish, and in my esteemed opinion, stroganoff is supposed to be served on egg noodles.

Otherwise, it was pretty similar to the more classic beef stroganoff. Here's what I did: Put a pot on to boil for the noodles. Add about a teaspoon of salt to the water and toss in the noodles when it's at a boil and cook until al dente.

While that's going dice some chicken, sprinkle with salt, pepper, rosemary and paprika. Slice about a quarter of an onion. Saute both in a skillet with a couple of tablespoons of butter or canola oil. Meanwhile, slice a handful of mushrooms (if you have a family that likes them, use as many as makes you happy. I used them sparingly since I'm the only one that eats them), and finely dice some garlic.

When the chicken is brown, add all that to the pan and saute until the mushrooms are soft and the garlic fragrant. When it's almost done, add a bit more butter, then a couple of tablespoons of flour to the pan. Cook for a couple of minutes, then whisk in some milk. Somewhere between half a cup and a whole cup. Just enough to make a bit of sauce. At this point, a took some out of the pan for Bill, because he hates sour cream. For the rest of it, add about half a cup of sour cream. Sit gently until it's melted in.

Toss the stroganoff with the cooked noodles and serve. Voila! Chicken stroganoff. It was relatively quick and easy to make, too. And other than the mushrooms, I almost always have the ingredients on hand.

We served it with a Cesar salad. Sounds nummy, yes?

I thought so, but we all know my opinion doesn't mean squat around here. The moment of truth for the one that picked the meal:













S0, what did the masses think? Well, Sam was quite rude and refused to even try it, so his opinion doesn't count. As for the other two, it got two thumbs up!



So, chicken stroganoff was definitely not a strike-it-off and we'll be adding it to our repertoire. A definite dinner win!