Buffalo Chicken Burgers & Patty Melts, Duck & Sweet Potato Curry, Miso Scallion Trout, Crispy Tofu & Mushrooms, Sweet Potato Pancakes & More!
Because we started hatching out own replacement chicks for our laying flocks, we’ve had a lot of roosters to process lately and we’ve been making lots of ground chicken. (And we should be able to roll out a retail, vacuum packed ground chicken product of our own to offer to you soon!).
So there’s been lots of ground chicken burgers, meatballs, smashed tacos and more.
Plus there was a really nice curry with duck stew meat, tomatoes, sweet potatoes and coconut cream, quick and easy miso scallion trout with steamed carrots, a big batch of crispy tofu for multiple different meals and my go to overnight oat and chia pancakes with pureed sweet potatoes.
Buffalo Chicken Burgers and…
For these burgers, I seasoned them with buffalo sauce, paprika, garlic and onion powder, plus breadcrumbs and an egg to bind them together. Once I flipped them, I added a mix of cheddar and gouda cheeses. For chicken burgers, since I want them cooked through and not medium or medium rare like beef burgers, I put them in the toaster oven to finish cooking without burning the bottom in the hot skillet.
I try to always have some slider size brioche buns from Bellegarde in my freezer ready to go for burgers, so I heated those up in the toaster oven.
We also made a big sheet pan of ridged potato fries/chips and salad with avocado and sunflower seeds, all in all a really good combo!
… Buffalo Chicken Patty Melts with Whipped Feta
A few nights later, we went the patty melt instead of burger bun route. And this time we had one of our first batches of primal ground chicken with the hearts and liver ground into the meat.
Because we’re grinding without skin, the mix is already lean and the organs meats don’t help it to stick together well for patties.
So I used the strategy I use for our lean ground goat meat when making gyros and pulsed red onion in the food processor first, then added the ground chicken, along with my seasonings (buffalo sauce, dijon mustard, paprika, garlic and onion powders) and feta to also help it bind together.
I brushed on some buffalo sauce while cooking, too, and finished them off with whipped feta and arugula. I guess we didn’t press the sandwiches in the pan and melt any cheese, so were they really patty melts? Whatever the case, they were good!
We had them with some mashed sweet potatoes and another really good salad — with beet kraut, crispy chickpeas, sunflower seeds and almond cashew dressing.
Duck Coconut Curry with Tomatoes & Sweet Potatoes
These were the last of the duck breasts from the retired muscovy ducks we butchered a few months ago.
Normally you think duck breast and think a decadent dish with a nice crispy seared fat layer, but these fellas lived a good long life and therefore they didn’t have tender, delicate breasts anymore. In general Muscovy duck almost tastes more like beef than poultry, some people even call it the ribeye of the sky!
So when we’ve had Muscovy meat from older ducks, I tend to treat it like beef stew meat and cut it into pieces and slow cook it.
I seared the pieces in a cast iron pan first and then transferred them to the crockpot. Next, I sautéed onions, collard stems and garlic and then added minced ginger and red curry paste and deglazed with soy sauce and coconut aminos. Then I transferred the veggie mixture to the crockpot, as well, and added pureed sweet potatoes, canned tomatoes and turkey bone broth.
I cooked it on high for 6.5 hours and then finished it with coconut cream. We had it as soup the first night, topped with cilantro, but also had some of the leftovers with rice and it was really good — hearty and filling and warming.
Miso Scallion Trout & Carrots
We’re still working through a solid supply of speckled trout from our fisherman friend and it comes in so handy for a quick dinner. Just roasting the filets in the oven for 10-12 minutes with some kind of sauce or seasoning comes out great every time.
This time I did a miso scallion flavor profile, mixing up some melted butter, white miso and onion salt and brushing on the the trout filets before roasted at 425 for 10 minutes or so. I also topped with sliced scallions.
I used the same sauce to steam some rainbow carrots and we had it with leftover Jasmine rice and a salad with a sesame vinaigrette with hearts of palm and wonton crisps.
Big Batch Crispy Tofu with:
When there’s tofu to use up at the shop, making a big pan of this crispy baked tofu means it will definitely get eaten! On salads or with rice or just as little nuggets dunked in sauce, you can’t go wrong.
Tomato Sweet Potato Soup: This time I had made a tomato sweet potato soup, blended with cashews and nutritional yeast (and seasonings, of course) as one way, of several, to use up some roasted sweet potatoes. And the tofu was a great soup topping, along with some Calabrian chili sauce and crispy scallions. I love the idea of a flavorful soup packed with veggies and pureed until smooth. But in reality, I get very bored with the texture of it, so having something to top it with is perfect.
Mushrooms, Rice, Salad & Peanut Sauce: We ate the soup and still had some tofu left, so one night I made some Jasmine rice, sautéed some mushrooms and made a really good peanut sauce. We rounded out the meal with a salad and topped everything with the peanut sauce and it really hit the spot!
Sweet Potato Overnight Oat Pancakes with Breakfast Sausage
This whole week, I was working through a bunch of roasted sweet potatoes that I had to use up and my favorite overnight oatmeal pancakes were a great way to finish up them up.
My usual method is to soak the oats and chia overnight in yogurt, buttermilk or a combination of milk and lemon juice. I added pureed sweet potato to the overnight oat mix and increased the oats and chia a bit to account for the extra moisture.
Then in the morning, I added flour, a little brown sugar, baking powder and baking soda, salt and spices (cinnamon and nutmeg in this case), along with a few eggs. The recipe makes 10-12 pancakes and they’re great as leftovers, too, especially toasted and then topped with nut butter.
We actually had a rare pack of our breakfast sausage with a failed vacuum seal, so we treated ourselves to some sausage patties along with the pancakes. And not pictured, the next day we sliced the pancakes in half and made a breakfast sandwich with the leftover sausage patties and fried eggs — so good!