Carmelized Onion and Mushroom Pizza with Chicken and Blue Cheese

Still using up leftovers from Sunday. Sweet. Here's a made-up variation on something I tried somewhat unsuccessfully a long time ago. This time it turned out great. And I have lunch for tomorrow too.

Ingredients
2 naan breads
1 cup leftover fried onions and mushrooms
1/2 cup diced cooked chicken
1/2 cup Gorgonzola cheese

Directions

1. Spread the onion and mushroom mixture on the naan breads.
   
2. Sprinkle on the chicken and pinched-off bits of cheese.
   
3. Bake at 400°F for 10 minutes.

Rice Pudding

I dove back into the Family Cookbook again tonight. I've been wanting to make rice pudding for a while now so I made extra rice on Sunday. This is a custard style rice pudding with lots of custard on top. I added a good 1/2 cup of raisins in memory of my other Grandfather.

Ingredients
1/2 cup cooked rice (I used brown rice and I used more like 1.5 cups)
3 eggs, beaten
1/2 cup sugar (brown)
1/4 tsp salt
vanilla
3.5 cups milk
nutmeg ( I couldn't find mine so I substituted cinnamon)

Directions

1. Mix all ingredients except nutmeg.
   
2. Pour in shallow baking dish and sprinkle with nutmeg.
   
3. Set in pan of hot water and bake at 300°F for 1.5 hours.
   

Venison Swiss Steak

OK. So you're probably thinking I should have called this blog "17 Million Ways to Cook Venison". That's really not the only thing I eat, really. I just happen to have quite a bit of it in my freezer and I don't have very much experience cooking with it, so I'm trying different things. Bear with me. We'll get through this together.

Over the Christmas holidays, my parents told me that they had tried my Grandmother's Swiss Steak recipe with venison round steak, and that it had been delicious. So I decided to try it for myself and I have to agree. It was delicious.

This recipe comes from my Family Cookbook (with my notes in parentheses).

Ingredients
2 lbs. round steak (2 venison round steaks)
flour (seasoned with salt & pepper)
1 Tbsp shortening (I used olive oil. This recipe's been around for a while)

1 large onion, thinly sliced
1 cup tomato juice (2 single serving cans)
1 cup tomato sauce (1 small can)
1/4 vinegar (rice vinegar)
1 Tbsp sugar (brown)
1/2 tsp dry mustard (I used probably about 1 tsp. I didn't really measure any of this stuff)
1/4 tsp chili powder (bump this way up to 2-3 tsp)
salt & pepper

Directions

1. Cut steaks into manageable pieces and pound flat with a meat mallet or the edge of a saucer.
   
2. Coat the meat with flour and brown it in the oil.
   
3. Add the rest of the ingredients, cover and simmer for 2.5 hours. (I set the meat aside and cooked the onions for a couple of minutes, then put the meat and everything else in the pan)
   
4. 
   

I made brown rice, baked Mediterranean vegetables with a Parmesan breadcrumb topping and fried onions and mushrooms to go along with the Swiss Steak. It all turned out great, but I'll put a bit less topping on the veg next time.

Marinated Venison Chops and Roasted Potatoes

I marinated venison chops in orange juice, lime juice, peanut butter, 2 crushed cayenne peppers, salt and pepper for 6 or 7 hours, then pan fried them. They were very good but were missing something. Probably needed more spice and/or salt, or maybe less orange and more lime.

To go along with it, I made oven roasted potatoes. I tried a hybrid of some advice I recently got from a friend and a recipe I saw on Jamie Oliver At Home. I really like oven roasted potatoes:

Cut in bite-size pieces, coat lightly in oil and spices, roast in 450°F oven for 40-45 minutes, turning once or twice.

So when a friend suggested that if I parboil the potatoes first, they'll turn out extra crispy, I wanted to give it a try. I also wanted to try Jamie Olivers roasted potatoes in balsamic vinegar. He made typical roasted potatoes with onions and garlic but he added about half a bottle of balsamic vinegar and they turned out black but not burnt.

I combined my new technique with Jamie's recipe and the potatoes turned out great. The balsamic turns black and delicious. The only thing is that because of all the vinegar, the potatoes didn't really get crispy. I'll have to try again with just oil, salt and pepper.

I also had honey and orange glazed carrots. I just followed the recipe on the back of the bag of frozen carrots. They were good but could have used some ginger and maybe more pepper. They were just a bit too sweet.