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The trashiest, tastiest toastie

This week’s recipe partially feels like a cheat. After all, it’s just a grilled cheese sandwich with a few extras. 

But it’s been a long year and I needed some comfort food. Besides, it *is* made with a few additions that make it at least a little unlike any grilled cheese I’ve made before, starting with coating the outside in mayonnaise. 

Chicken cheese toastie ingredients.

Before I get to any additional weirdness, though, I want to explain how I came to make this recipe to begin with. It’s a fun story time, I promise. 

I came across a click-baity article a couple months ago that was about the kind of conspiracy theory I can get behind, one that is quite harmless and mostly meaningless. That is, the theory that the Nando’s brand medium peri peri sauce is in fact spicier than its hot variety. I’ve long been a fan of peri peri sauce, as it’s a not-too-hot hot sauce for my tastes and its extremely flavorful beyond just spicy. And Nando’s is the brand I typically buy. 

So, I went ahead and bought a bottle of both and conducted a taste test with some quite tasty chicken wings. My sweetie, who had not seen which was which when I placed it on the plate, was fooled into thinking the medium was the hot sauce. While I could not likewise do a blind taste test, I shared his opinion. 

The wings, however, did not use up all the sauce and we had two bottles (actually four, because I also sampled some other varieties) in our fridge, looking for an excuse to be used. So, I perused the recipe booklet that came with the bottles and couldn’t resist the toastie (read: grilled cheese) recipe. It had chicken, peri peri, cheese, and then was supposed to be coated in peri peri-based mayonnaise; while I didn’t have the Nando’s brand mayonnaise, I did have some powdered peri peri lying around, so I mixed it together with mayonnaise. 

The result was more or less what I expected: spicy grilled cheese with chicken. And a lot of filling for two sammies. Which means, it was a frickin’ delight! 

The mayonnaise cooked the outside a little too well, but I should have turned the stove down when the first side came up a bit blackened. Otherwise, though, I loved every unhealthy bite. 

Slightly burnt but the tastiest toastie I’ve ever made.

Here’s what I did, following the booklet recipe other than faking the “perinaise”: 

Ingredients

  • 1 ½ c. cooked chicken, cubed or shredded
  • 1 ½ c. shredded sharp cheddar
  • ½ c. peri peri sauce (whichever level of spice you prefer, but remember, the medium may be hotter!)
  • ¼ mayonnaise 
  • Peri peri powder, to taste (optional)
  • 4 slices of bread
  • Vegetable oil

Directions

In a medium bowl, mix together the chicken, cheese, and peri peri sauce. In a small bowl, stir together the mayonnaise and peri peri powder, if using. 

Spread the chicken and cheese mixture over two slices of bread. Top with the remaining two slices of bread. 

Spread the ½ the mayonnaise mixture on one side of the top of both bread slices. 

Heat a 9-inch skillet over medium to medium-low heat. Add a splash of vegetable oil. 

Place one sandwich, mayonnaise side down, and spread half the remaining mayonnaise on the top of the bread in the skillet while it cooks. Cook for 2 ½ to 3 minutes until golden, and adjust temperature as needed. Once golden, flip the toastie and cook on the other side for another 2 ½ to 3 minutes until golden and the center is warmed and melty. 

Repeat the process with the remaining sandwich, using up the rest of the mayonnaise to coat the last bare slice of bread, and enjoy with a healthy salad to counterbalance this delectable dinner! 

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Perfect timing for first sheet pan chicken

After my blog post a couple weeks ago where I roasted asparagus (with tilapia), a good friend reached out to me to rave about roasting vegetables.

During our back and forth, she mentioned that one of her newly discovered favorites was roasted radishes. The idea intrigued me, as did her description of their taste as “so sweet and caramely.”

I made a mental note to try it at some vague point in the future, but I admit I didn’t immediately go out and seek a recipe or even just put radishes on my grocery list. And yet, just a few days later I was scrolling Twitter when I found a sheet pan recipe from Epicurious that included roasted potatoes, and yes, radishes.

Sheet pan paprika chicken with roast vegetables ingredients.

Even better, it combined them with a roast chicken and my list of sheet pan roast chicken recipes has been growing, and I hadn’t yet made one. And, if that all wasn’t enough, the food was flavored with a simple sauce that was mostly paprika, garlic, and mayonnaise.

I decided right then it’d be my next blog post.

It was perhaps a bit ambitious to make it on a weeknight, but I was determined. And if I’m honest, it still wasn’t that bad. It would have been better if the timing listed in the recipe was enough to be safe that the chicken was cooked through instead of an additional 10 to 15 minutes. But otherwise, there was a lot of down time between steps, enough that I could do dishes, even.

And the end result couldn’t have tasted better. The chicken was perfect; the potatoes sufficiently roasted; and the radishes — wow, they just burst with flavor and juices. It was an amazing combination, made better by the addition of a simple salsa verde that used up the radish greens.

I can say I’ll be returning to roast radishes, and this recipe, again.

So many good flavors combined. Nom noms.

Here’s what I did, tweaking the recipe a bit:

Ingredients

  • 1 whole chicken
  • ½ c. mayonnaise,
  • 1 T. paprika (smoked if possible),
  • 4 cloves garlic, divided
  • Salt and pepper, to taste
  • 1 lb. golden potatoes, cut into fourths or eighths
  • 2 bunches radishes, halved, reserving greens
  • 1 bunch cilantro, with tender stems
  • 1 bunch parsley, with tender stems
  • ⅔ c. olive oil
  • Zest from 1 lemon
  • Juice from 1 lemon

Directions

Place oven rack in the middle of the oven, and heat to 425 degrees.

In a small bowl, combine the mayonnaise, paprika, half the garlic cloves, and salt and pepper. Once mixed, move  2 to 3 T. of the mix into a large bowl (it will ultimately be mixed with the vegetables so bigger bowls are better).

Pat the inside and outside of the chicken dry. Place on a large sheet pan with rimmed edges. Coat the mayonnaise mix from the small bowl under the skin of the chicken and outside it, including on legs. Tie together the legs with kitchen twine.

Bake the chicken for about 25 minutes.

Meanwhile, prepare the vegetables. Toss the potatoes and radishes with the reserved mayonnaise mixture in the large bowl.

After 25 minutes, reduce the oven temperature to 400 degrees, and remove the chicken from oven. In a single layer, add the potatoes and radishes to the pan around the chicken.

Continue to bake for another 20 to 25 minutes, or until the chicken is cooked through.

Meanwhile, in a blender, mix together the parsley, cilantro, radish leaves, olive oil, lemon zest, and lemon juice, the remaining garlic cloves, and salt and pepper. Blend until coarsely chopped.

Once chicken is cooked through, transfer it to a cutting board and let cool for 15 minutes before carving. Serve the chicken with the roasted vegetables and salsa verde, and enjoy!