HOME & LIVING
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 2021
THE OBSERVER & BAKER CITY HERALD — B3
Crunchy chicken tenders, quick coleslaw a perfect match
By LINDA GASSENHEIMER
Tribune News Service
You don’t need a fryer or
air fryer for these crispy, fried
chicken tenders. They bake in
minutes in your oven. The secret
is to place them on a roasting rack
over a baking tray so air circu-
lates around all sides. Chicken ten-
ders or tenderloin are part of the
chicken breast and are attached
to the underside of each chicken
breast. They’re small and moist
and are sold in most markets.
To give the chicken extra fl avor
and to keep them moist, I stuff ed
the chicken tenders with boursin
garlic and fi ne herbs cheese. You
can use any type of creamy, soft
cheese. Choose one that is fl avored
with onion or herbs.
The quick coleslaw recipe is
perfect with the crunchy chicken
tenders. Adding some mayonnaise
and vinegar to bought coleslaw
mix means you can have home-
made coleslaw in less than 5 min-
utes. If you’re pressed for time,
just use a bought deli coleslaw.
Helpful Hints
• You can use cracker crumbs
instead of panko breadcrumbs.
• You can use boneless skin-
less chicken breast instead of ten-
ders. Cut them into smaller pieces,
about 6 inches long and 3 inches
wide.
Countdown
• Preheat oven to 400 degrees
Fahrenheit.
• Prepare chicken tenders and
place in the oven.
• While chicken bakes, make
coleslaw.
Shopping List
To buy: 3/4 pound chicken ten-
ders, 1 package boursin garlic and
fi ne herbs cheese (or other soft
cheese), 1 container panko bread
crumbs,1 bottle distilled white
vinegar, 1 jar reduced-fat mayon-
naise, 1 bag ready-to-eat coleslaw
mix and 1 can olive oil spray.
Staples: fl our, eggs, sugar, salt
and black peppercorns.
OVEN-FRIED
CHICKEN
TENDERS
Recipe by Linda Gassenheimer
Olive oil spray
1/4 cup fl our
3/4 pound chicken tenders
4 tablespoons boursin garlic
and fi ne herbs cheese
1/4 cup panko breadcrumbs
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 egg whites, lightly broken
up with a fork
Linda Gassenheimer/TNS
Oven-fried chicken tenders with coleslaw.
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Line
a baking tray with foil and add panko
bread crumbs. Place in the oven while it
preheats for about 2 to 3 minutes. Watch
to see that the breadcrumbs don’t burn.
They should be a golden color. Remove
from oven and spoon breadcrumbs
onto a plate. Sprinkle crumbs with salt
and pepper to taste. Add a roasting rack
to the baking tray. Spray with olive oil
spray. Set aside.
Make a slit in the long side of the
chicken tenders about 3 inches long and
to 1/4-inch of the other side to form a
pocket. Spoon the boursin cheese into
the pockets and squeeze the tenders
closed. Roll the closed chicken in the
fl our and dip in the egg whites. Then roll
in the breadcrumbs to coat. Place on the
roasting rack. Spray with olive oil spray.
Bake 15 minutes or until meat thermom-
eter reaches 165 degrees.
Yield 2 servings.
Per serving: 469 calories (38% from
fat), 19.8 g fat (9.3 g saturated, 3.5 g
monounsaturated), 156 mg cholesterol,
47.3 g protein, 23.4 g carbohydrates, 1 g
fi ber, 412 mg sodium.
QUICK COLESLAW
Recipe by Linda Gassenheimer
2 tablespoons reduced-fat mayonnaise
2 tablespoons distilled white vinegar
1 teaspoon sugar
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 cups washed, ready-to-eat coleslaw mix
Mix mayonnaise, vinegar and sugar
together in a medium-size bowl. Add
salt and pepper to taste. Add the
coleslaw mix. Toss well making sure
all of the vegetables are coated with
the sauce. Add more salt and pepper,
if needed.
Yield 2 servings.
Per serving: 78 calories (57% from
fat), 4.9 g fat (0.7 g saturated, 1.1 g
monounsaturated), no cholesterol, 1
g protein, 7.3 g carbohydrates, 1.8 g
fi ber, 121 mg sodium.
Explore the secret history of food
By DANIEL NEMAN
the air was crowded with
birds and the ocean, espe-
cially, was teeming with
fi sh.
And yet, three-quarters
of the English colonists in
Jamestown, Virginia, died
during the winter of 1609-
1610, a period known as
the Starving Time. While
food was potentially plen-
tiful, the colonists had
neglected to bring with
them the means to collect
it. Without fi shing nets,
one colonist attempted to
catch fi sh with a frying
pan.
He was not successful.
The book also covers
the low regard with which
potatoes were held for at
least a couple of centu-
ries. Part of the nightshade
family — along with toma-
toes and eggplant — they
were naturally associated
with witchcraft and Dev-
il-worship. Russians of the
18th century called them
“the Devil’s apples” and
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
In 1942, the USS Lex-
ington, the second-largest
aircraft carrier in the Navy
at the time, was sunk by
Japanese torpedoes and
bombs during the Battle of
the Coral Sea.
Before abandoning
ship, sailors grabbed all
the ice cream they could.
Some scooped it into their
helmets before lowering
themselves into the water.
This weird food fact,
and plenty more like it,
can be found in “The
Secret History of Food,”
by Matt Siegel, which
came out last week. I
happen to like weird food
facts, and so the book was
right up my alley (despite
its frequent rambling and
its tendency to veer off
into angry screeds about
modern society).
Keeping to the theme
of ice cream during World
War II, we learn that
some U.S. bomber crews
strapped buckets of ice
cream mix to the outside
of their planes. The vibra-
tion of the engines — and
the machine-gun fi re —
churned the mix while the
cold temperatures at high
altitude froze it into ice
cream.
Ice cream helped the
fi ghters’ morale, and so
did comfort food. A mess
sergeant who was in a
prisoner-of-war camp for
43 months whiled away
his time in confi nement by
creating menus for a big,
if nonexistent, Christmas
dinner. Other prisoners
started asking for specifi c
dishes to be put on the fi c-
tional menu.
What struck a woman
who later catalogued these
menus is how few of the
burned them at the stake.
They were also believed to
cause syphilis and leprosy.
These days, Americans
consume an average of 47
pounds of potatoes every
year, far more by weight
than any other vegetable.
I got a particular kick
out of this tidbit: Napo-
leon said that he could
conquer all of Europe if
he had fresh bread. In
1795, the emperor — who
often spoke of the impor-
tance of a full belly to an
army — off ered a reward
of 12,000 francs to anyone
who could improve his
military’s method of trans-
porting and preserving
food.
The prize was claimed
14 years later by a candy
maker named Nicolas
Appert, who essentially
invented the method of
using boiling water to can
foods in a sealed glass jar.
He later switched to tin
cans. For his eff orts, he is
remembered as the father
of canned food.
And fi nally, the book
presents one tidbit that is
too good not to share. In
2016, West Virginia law-
makers struck down a ban
on raw milk and celebrated
their victory by drinking
raw milk.
Several became ill, and
three had to go to the hos-
pital or an urgent care
facility. Some of the legis-
lators noted that a stomach
bug was going around at
the same time, and that,
as the delegate who dis-
tributed the milk said, “It
didn’t have nothing to do
with that milk” and “It
ain’t because of the raw
milk.”
No tests could be made
on the remaining milk,
because he fl ushed it down
the toilet. As the book sar-
castically puts it, “appar-
ently, (that is) something
he normally does with per-
fectly good milk.”
HarperCollins Publishers
“The Secret History of Food,” by Matt Siegel.
requested dishes were
sophisticated foods the
POWs may have had at
elegant restaurants: scal-
lops or oysters or Cha-
teaubriand. Most of the
food they wanted to think
about was “home food
of childhood which rep-
resented unconditional
love, without cares or
responsibilities.”
You may know that pie
crusts, as they were orig-
inally baked in England,
were thick and hard and
intentionally inedible; they
were meant only to hold
the fi lling as it cooked, and
then be discarded.
But pie became an
American institution —
people were known to eat
it for breakfast, lunch and
dinner in the 19th century
— because early colonists
faced a shortage of wheat
in these lands. Less wheat
meant the crusts had to be
thinner, and by extension,
fl akier.
That made them not
only edible, but delicious.
When the very fi rst
colonists came to these
shores, they found an
extraordinary availability
of food. The woods were
full of game, the fi elds
were bursting with berries,
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