Orange-Scented Honey Butter Popcorn

You know one of the best benefits of working from home? You can wear your pajama pants all day if you choose. I don't often go this route because I'm trying to maintain some semblance of humanity. But y'know there are days where even leggings are too much.

And then there are days when plain buttered popcorn is simply not enough. You know I love to play around with my popcorn-- cinnamon toast, a trifecta of tropical flavors, and an herby mix have all made appearances. 

I grew up eating honey butter with my hushpuppies but never thought to put it on my popcorn. And let us not forget that in the midst of a dreary winter there is vibrancy to be found in citrus. It's the perfect lunch snack.

You'll need: butter, honey, an orange, popcorn kernels, salt, and vegetable oil (not pictured).

Toss the kernels with oil and a touch of salt in a medium saucepan. You need it to be big enough to accomodate the popped corn. 

When the first kernels begin popping, slap the lid over the pot and start moving it over the burner. Keep it moving until the sound slows to a few seconds between pops.

Okay real talk. I should've just melted the butter into the honey. It would've been easier.

Because they're kind of hard to stir together. You might lose butter and that's just not cool.

Toss the popcorn with the honey butter in a large bowl. Trust me on this. I've tried too-small bowls before and it just ends in frustration and poorly coated corn.

Grate a little orange peel in there with a zester and toss to coat evenly. Honestly, just a teaspoon will do.  Oh and add a little more salt.

The bright, fragrant scent of orange and floral honey are grounded by rich, salty butter. Don't let the small serving bowl fool you-- I ate the whole thing.

Orange-Scented Honey Butter Popcorn (makes about 5 cups)

2 tsp vegetable oil

1/4 c popcorn kernels

Salt to taste

2 tbs salted butter

2 tbs honey

1 tsp orange zest

• In a medium saucepan with a lid, toss the oil, kernels, and a pinch of salt together. Heat the pan over medium-high heat. When the first couple of kernels pop, cover the pan with the lid and slide the pan back and forth over the burner
• When popping slows to a 3-4 seconds between sounds, take the popcorn off the heat. Pour it into a large bowl.
• Melt the butter into the honey and pour over the popped corn. Toss with a little more salt and the orange zest. Serve right away.

Fried Chicken Biscuits

So guess what I'm doing in October. The Color Me Rad 5k! Remember when I made a resolution to do a 5k this year? Well I'm keeping it. No, it's not a crazy mud run, though my sister and I want to do one of those too sometime. It pretty much sounds like the most delightful situation you could put yourself in when running. At every kilometer you get this color dust thrown on you so that at the end you look like a walking rainbow. Doesn't that sound fun?! I'm running as an individual even though I'll be running with my sister, but I had to come up with a team name. Will and I brainstormed and finally came up with Rainbow: First Blood. Like Rambo: First Blood but...Rainbow because it's a color run. Get it?!

So obviously in the coming months I'll need to carbo-load. With fried chicken biscuits. What could go wrong?

These biscuits come together in three-ish parts. Step one: Make a simple buttermilk biscuit. You'll need: all-purpose flour, butter, buttermilk, baking powder, salt, and baking soda.

As always, give the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt a good whisk.

Add your cold butter and cut it in with a pastry blender. Or a couple of knives. I've never actually used the knife method because I really like my pastry blender.

You want the butter to be about the size of small pebbles.

 Stir in your buttermilk.

And you should get a shaggy dough that'll come together when you pat it out.

 I prefer to pat my dough to about a 1/2" thickness as opposed to rolling it with a rolling pin. It's probably not as precise, but biscuits aren't exactly a highfalutin undertaking.

Use a two-inch biscuit cutter to cut out as many biscuits as you can. I got about seven out of this batch.

Bake about 15 minutes in a 400º oven.

In the meantime, put together your honey glaze. It's just a little honey, thyme, and bourbon. You can leave out the bourbon if you abstain.

Heat the honey and bourbon over medium heat until the honey has loosened up and blends with the bourbon.

Add a few sprigs of thyme and steep off the heat for 5-10 minutes. Discard the thyme leaves.

See that biscuit? It's about to get the treatment.

Brush the tops of the warm biscuits with the honey glaze. I would pay for someone to do this to my face.

And now, the hard part. Which really isn't all the hard as frying goes. You'll need: Flour, black pepper, paprika, cayenne, salt, and chicken thighs.

These are boneless, skinless thighs that I cut into smaller pieces to make them biscuit-appropriate. You could use breasts if you prefer white meat, but I like a thigh. Sprinkle a little salt and pepper over the chicken.

Season your flour with more salt and pepper, plus paprika and cayenne. Add a few pieces of chicken and coat them with flour. Make sure you get all the nooks and crannies.

Carefully place about four pieces of chicken in about an inch of peanut oil that's been heated to about 365º. An easy test is to drop a little flour in the oil first. If it sizzles the oil is ready. If it doesn't, let it heat some more. If it pops at you, it's too hot. Cover the pan and let it brown on one side, about 5 minutes. Turn the chicken, cover, and let it fry until golden on the other side. I will note that I probably could've used a little less oil in this pan.

Drain your pieces of chicken on a wire rack that has paper towels under it to catch the grease.

 I think these biscuits are best with a little more of that honey glaze drizzled over the chicken and open biscuit.

A tender, buttery biscuit never had a better match than a crispy bite of fried chicken. Except for maybe country ham. Or sausage. Whatevs, I'm in training.

Fried Chicken Biscuits (makes 6-8 biscuits)

Biscuits:
2 c all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp kosher salt
8 tbs unsalted butter, very cold
2/3 c buttermilk

Honey Glaze:
1/4 c honey
1 tbs bourbon
2-3 sprigs fresh thyme

Fried Chicken:
1 c all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp salt, plus more for chicken
1/4 tsp black pepper, plus more for chicken
1/4 tsp paprika
1/8 tsp cayenne
1 pound boneless, skinless chicken thighs, cut into biscuit-sized pieces
Peanut oil, for frying

• Preheat oven to 400º. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. For biscuits, whisk together flour, baking powder, soda, and salt in a large bowl. Add the cold butter and cut it in with a pastry blender. When the butter is the size of small pebbles, stir in the buttermilk until a shaggy dough just forms. Turn the dough out onto a floured work surface and pat or roll into a round about 1/2" thick. Cut out biscuits with a 2-inch cutter and place on prepared baking sheet. Bake biscuits 13-15 minutes.
• While biscuits are baking, combine honey and bourbon in a small saucepan over medium heat. Heat until the honey has dissolved into the bourbon, about 3-5 minutes. Remove from heat and add thyme sprigs. Steep 5-10 minutes and discard thyme. Brush biscuit tops with the honey glaze while they're still warm.
• For the chicken, whisk together flour, salt, pepper, paprika, and cayenne. Sprinkle additional salt and pepper over the chicken pieces. Begin heating about an inch of oil in a medium cast iron skillet. Coat chicken with the flour mixture, making sure to get all the nooks and crannies. Add about four pieces of chicken to the hot oil and cover. Cook 4-5 minutes or until golden brown on one side, then flip the chicken. Cover and cook an additional 4-5 minutes or until golden brown on the other side. Remove chicken and drain on a wire rack or paper towels. Repeat until all the chicken has been fried.
• Slice biscuits in half and top with chicken and more honey glaze. Eat with gusto.

Citrus & Honey Custard

Hello, friends. I'm about 20 minutes from heading down to Panama City with Will. We haven't seen each other since March, and the poor guy has only been to the beach once this summer. It looks like we're going to have beautiful weather for our trip. That is, it looks sunny and therefore hot as the dickens.

So you'd think that this far into summer I'd have some sort of icy granita or ice box cake. Something that didn't require a stove. Negative. But! This isn't your average custard. Instead of eggs, citrus juice thickens it and allows it to set in the fridge. And it's only on the stove about five minutes. It's actually quite perfect for summer.

Easy Leek Tart and My New Favorite Thing

Before I get into the feature food for today, I have to tell you about my new favorite snack.  As in, I just made this and ate it and fell in love.  Pardon my run-on sentence.  I've been eyeing the honey at Fresh Market the past few times I've been in there.  I caved today and bought some raw tupelo honey produced by The Savannah Bee Company.

The label says it never crystallizes and has a buttery taste and smooth texture.  Um yeah.  Honeys are sort of like snowflakes; no two are exactly the same.  The notes of honey are determined by the flower the bees decide to snack on that day. So this tupelo honey will taste different from orange blossom honey or clover honey.

I bought this almond butter packet the other day (also from Fresh Market) mostly because I thought it was brilliant marketing.  I've always wanted to try almond butter but didn't want to invest in a whole jar of it if it turned out I didn't care for it.  Enter this little squeezy pack of Justin's Almond Butter.  I'm pretty sure I saw him on the Cooking Channel the other day after I'd bought this.  Anyhow, it's enough for a sandwich or two, so I used some today.

So I made a half sammich with the honey and almond butter.  Remember those kind of gross sandwiches they served at school with peanut butter and honey that may or may not have been from 1995?  Yeah, there's no competition.  I don't have a picture of it because I ate it and then decided to tell you about it.  Oops.  Do yourself a favor and buy some good honey and a packet (or two...or a jar) of almond butter and make a sammich.

Now for the big to-do.  I made an easy leek pastry last night with goat cheese and prosciutto.  Yummm.  Truth be told, my mom and I probably could've eaten it as dinner, but we both ate two slices and a bowl of chili.  Overkill.