After eating some seriously amazing food in Portland I came home determined to cook more good food and that is when I discovered that a minor travesty has been going on for over a year in my kitchen cupboard; Kevin and I registered for, and received, a Le Creuset pot as a wedding present and it has sat on a shelf unused for a year. A whole year! How this happened I do not know, but when I pulled it down the other day there the price tag sticker sat, in pristine condition on the bottom on the pot. Mocking me. So, I quickly set about fixing the problem by cooking two amazing dinners in it. And damn I love that pot! And the food that came out of it!

Both of the dinners I made came from my all time favorite cook book The Gourtment Cookbook. Eighty percent of what I cook comes out of this book and I have yet to be disappointed with any of the meals I have made from it. For Le Creuset’s first meal I made Chicken with Forty Cloves of Garlic.

Ingredients:

1 (4 lb) chicken, rinsed and patted dry

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon ground pepper

1 scant cup olive oil

2 fresh flat leaf parsley sprigs

1 fresh rosemary sprig

1 fresh thyme sprig

1 fresh sage sprig

1 Turkish bay leaf

1 celerey rib

40 garlic cloves, peeled (from 3-4 heads)

Instructions:

Put rack in middle of oven and preheat to 350 F

Sprinkle chicken inside and out with salt and pepper. Tie legs together with kitchen string and fold wings under chickn. Heat oil in 6- to 8- quart wide heavy oven proof pot (enter the Le Creuset!) over moderately high hear until hot but not smoking, Add chicken and sear, turning it carefully, until golden brown all over, about 10 min. Transfer chicken to plate.

Tie the herbs and celery rib together with string and add to pot (I don’t have string, so I just threw it in the pot). Scatter garlic over the bottom of the pot and put chicken breast side up on top. Cover tightly (not a problem because the Le Creuset lid weighs about 5 pounds), transfer to oven and bake, basting twice, until thermometer inserted into thickest part of a thigh (without touching bone) registers 170 F. Transfer chicken to cutting board and let sit for 10 min. Reserve pan juices. Spread garlic on toast and cut chicken into pieces and serve with some of the pan juices.

Yummy!

Now I always eat my food before I remember that I am supposed to take a photo of it, but I encourage you to make this recipe yourself to see (and taste) how the dish turns out.

For the second recipe I made Black Bean Chile, which went great with the leftover chicken we had, and also made some killer Juevos Rancheros the next morning. I have made bean chile before, but honestly it wasn’t nearly as good as this one (and I know this as a fact because Kevin said “Hot damn, that is good chile,” or something like that.Whereas when I made the other chile and asked his opinion he said, “Well you seem to like it, but really I just think it’s okay,” again I may be paraphrasing).

Ingredients:

1 lb black beans (about 2 cups) picked over, rinsed and soaked

1 tablespoon cumin seeds

2 teaspoons paprika

1/2 teaspoon cayanne

1 teaspoon dried oregeno, crumbled

1 small dried pasilla chile, stem and seeds discarded, coarsely chopped (Now I live in Canada where Mexican food seems to be a foreign concept – so I just used a Chipotle chile – which I found dried at Market on Millstream)

3 tablespoons veggie oil (which I almost never cook with, so I just used butter)

1 medium onion, finely chopped

1 green bell pepper, cored, seeded and finely chopped

4 garlic cloves, minced (but since I used all the garlic in my house the night before I just threw in some of the roasted garlic that I had leftover)

1 tablespoon chapped canned chipotle chiles in adobo (again, I live in Canada, so I just grated a bit extra of the dried chipotle chile I had)

1 turkish bay lef

6 cups water

1 (14-ounce) can whole tomatoes in juice, drained (juice reserved) and chopped

salt (I found I needed quite a bit)

1/2 cup fresh cilantro

Oh, I also added corn and carrots to the stew. I often throw in extra veggies to stews/chiles. I take after my mom and with cooking, at least, I take the recipe as a rough guide not the end all of how something can be made. Baking though, I take very seriously and always follow recipes. 

Instructions:

Soak beans in enough water to cover by 2 inches, refrigerated, for at least 8 hours. Drain.

Toast cumin, paprika, cayenne, and oregano in a dry small heavy skillet over moderate heat (I just used the Le Creuset pot for all of this), stirring constantly, until fragrant and a shade or two darker, about 2 min. Transfer to bowl.

Finely grate pasilla in coffee grinder (or in my case just use my micro-plane grater and grate chipotle chile and toast with other spices).

Heat oil (again I used butter) in 5- to 6-quart wide heavy pot over moderately high heat until hot but not smoking. Quickly add onion and bell peppers and cook, stirring occasionally, until onion is golden, 6 to 8 minutes. Add garlic, chipotles, and spice mix, reduce heat to moderate and cook, stirring occasionally, for 5 min. Add beans, bay leaf, and water, bring to a simmer, and simmer, covered until beans are tender, 1 to 1 1/2 hours.

Add tomatoes, with their juice and salt to taste and simmer, uncovered for 15 more min. Discard bay leaf and add cilantro just before serving (unless you are like Mrs. Child and hate the taste of cilantro).

I also threw a dollop of sour cream in my stew before chowing down.

Yummy!

Le Creuset I won’t neglect you in the next year, I promise. Cast iron pots/pans have found a way into Kevin and my life in a serious way – nearly every morning we use our caste iron skillet to make breakfast – and even though they are old school technology they are amazing and hold heat better than any other pot (or pan) in our house.

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