Recently in Complete Meals Category

When I was a child, mom HATED carving pumpkins. I never understood this until I then tried to carve my own for the very first time. Have you ever tried to gut a pumpkin? The smell is... well... distinctive. You'll never forget that smell for the rest of your life. It isn't even a bad smell, but it is very distinctive.

The feel of pumpkin innards isn't all that pleasant either. Unlike a lot of other squash, pumpkins have this amazing combination of stringy, spongy, slimy, and springy. You need a rather sharp spoon or a very strong hand to adequately carve out the insides.

So now I understand exactly why my mother hated carving pumpkins. Mom, listen up... "You were right."

Now that I've made my mother happy for the day, we'll move on to today's recipe - Stuffed Pumpkins!

Yes, we're not only going to partially carve a pumpkin, we're going to stuff it full of all sorts of goodness and bake it in the oven. We got a couple of pie pumpkins from our CSA, Growing Washington.

Ingredients

• 2 small pie pumpkins
• 2 links of hot Italian Sausage (ours was from Skagit River Ranch)
• 2 cups Emmer from Bluebird Grain Farms (or white or brown rice)
• 1 large onion
• Any of the following:
• Fresh hot peppers
• Parmesan cheese
• Chopped kale or spinach
• Carrots
• Potatoes
• Garlic

 

Start by cutting the top off your pumpkin. You want to make the opening at least big enough to fit your hand. Trust me on this.

Scrape out the innards. Save them though! Afterwards we're going to separate out the seeds.

Start cooking the emmer or the rice.

When the pumpkin is nice and clean inside (which could take you up to 15 minutes), rub a little olive oil inside and bake at 350 for 30 minutes, or until the inside of the pumpkin is starting to soften. The outside should still be rigid.

While the pumpkin is cooking, take the sausage out of its casing and saute until most of the pink is gone.

Dice the onion, and any of the other vegetables you want to throw in. Cook them in with the pork for 10 minutes.

In a large bowl, combine the emmer or rice, and the sausage mixture. Add some Parmesan cheese and any spices you want. Suggestions include smoked paprika, sea salt and pepper, cinnamon, cumin, coriander, nutmeg, or thyme.

Stuff the pumpkin with the mixture and return to the oven for an additional 20-30 minutes, or until the pumpkin has softened to be nearly fork tender from the outside.

Serve, being very careful eating as the inside of the pumpkin is very hot.

Patricia's Notes:  This was quite tasty. I didn't cook my pumpkins long enough, so I didn't eat quite as much squash as I would have preferred. I used a mixture of smoked paprika and nutmeg for the spices and the dish had a spicy sweetness to it. I would definitely make these again, especially if someone gave me a pre-scooped pumpkin. I spent about 20 minutes separating out the pumpkin seeds afterwards, and tomorrow we'll roast them up for a tasty snack.

I make no apologies for this next statement. I. Love. Meat. I've always loved meat. Beef, pork, chicken, turkey, buffalo, bison... Not only do I love meat, but we eat a fair amount of it since my wonderful husband is diabetic and needs a fair amount of protein at each meal. However, one of the ways to reduce your impact on the environment is to reduce your meat consumption. Grass fed beef can actually give back to the environment by allowing the soil to absorb more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, but even with that, there is still some methane production to deal with.

One of the suggestions I took away from the evening with Michael Pollan the other week was that we should try to have one meatless meal a week (I'd go as far as a meatless day for me, though the husband still needs some sort of meat or fish with at least one meal).

So when we found a recipe for baked beans that used (of all things) BEER, we decided to give it a try. I was skeptical all the way up to the first bite. After that, I was hooked. I will never make baked beans from a can ever again. We picked up some great cranberry beans from our friends at Alm Hill Gardens/Growing Washington.

Ingredients

• 2 cups cranberry beans (or pinto beans)
• 1 Tbsp olive oil
• 1 medium red onion
• 1/4 cup honey
• 1 Tbsp Chardonnay Mustard from Sea Breeze Farms
• 2 dried hot peppers
• 3 cups beer*
• 1/2 cup chopped dried fruit*
• 2 cups vegetable broth
• Smoked paprika
• Salt

 

Soak your beans overnight in water. (I've heard anecdotal reports that changing the water frequently will help reduce gas after eating, but your mileage may vary.)

Dice the onion and saute in a Dutch oven with the olive oil for 2-3 minutes.

Add the honey (or molasses or agave nectar), the mustard, dried peppers, the beer, the dried fruit, and the broth. Bring to a simmer on the stove and then cover and bake at 350 for anywhere from 1.5-2.5 hours. Start checking the beans for doneness after about an hour and a half. If the beans are done before the liquid has reduced sufficiently, move the Dutch oven to the stovetop and bring to a boil uncovered, stirring regularly, until the liquid has the right consistency.

Season with some smoked paprika and maybe some salt. Serve with some crusty bread.

Patricia's Notes: When choosing your beer, go with some sort of berry or fruit beer. We used an Elderberry beer and dried peaches. However the original recipe suggested making sure your beer and your dried fruit "went together". So dried raspberries with raspberry beer. Dried peaches with a peach beer, etc. This isn't a requirement as we found out, but next time we might try to follow this suggestion. We did end up using chicken broth, so our version wasn't completely vegetarian, but that's just because I had fresh chicken broth in the fridge and decided to use it up. The original recipe called for molasses, but we used honey to keep it more local. 

When the beans were cooking, they smelled WONDERFUL. I used to make baked beans with half a pound of bacon and these beans smelled almost exactly the same. They were rich, thick, and almost pasty (I cooked mine just a tiny bit too long). They reheated very well for lunches for the rest of the week as well.

Some days just don't turn out the way you hope. Oh Saturday started out well enough. Tsugaru apples are on  their way out and we picked up a big box to make into apple butter this week. However after that, things just went downhill. But that's life sometimes and even though the thought of take-out pizza sounded pretty darn good, I decided to opt for something healthier and more local. I made Minestrone.

A true Italian soup, it deserves to be made in a truly Italian way: from scratch and with minimal measuring. Here's a rough guide for a tasty soup that takes under an hour to prepare.

Ingredients

• Beef broth (at least 4 cups)
• 3 cups chopped tomatoes
• 2 cups chopped carrots
• 2 stalks celery
• 1 onion
• 5 cloves of garlic
• 2 small dried hot peppers
• 1 cup red wine (optional)
• Fresh herbs (a mix)
• Salt and pepper
• 2 links Andouille sausage
• 1 cup dried pasta (optional)
• Grated Parmesan cheese

 

Chop the onion and garlic. Rough chopping is fine here, as it all cooks down pretty well.

In a large soup pot, heat some olive oil over medium heat.

Saute the onion and garlic until fragrant and translucent. Season with a bit of salt and pepper.

Add the carrots and celery and saute another few minutes.

Pour in the beef broth, the red wine, and the tomatoes and season with whatever fresh herbs you have around (good ones would be rosemary, thyme, sage, oregano, and basil). Add the dried hot peppers as well. You can even leave them whole.

Turn the heat up just a bit and simmer the soup for about 15 minutes.

Slice the Andouille sausage and add to the simmering pot. Note: If your sausage isn't fully cooked, you'll need to cook it in a fry pan or on the grill first.

Simmer for another 5-10 minutes. At this point, taste the soup. You might want to consider adding hot pepper flakes, salt and pepper, or even some water if the soup is too strong.

If you want to add pasta, throw it right in the soup and cook until the pasta is done.

Serve topped with some grated Parmesan cheese and crusty bread.

Patricia's Notes: You can add just about any vegetable to this dish. Kale and spinach should be added in the last 5 minutes of cooking. Peppers can be added at the same time as the carrots. Turnips or parsnips would even work here. I like my Minestrone spicy, so I used some pretty hot peppers, but you can easily omit them for a mild flavor.

Now that fresh salmon is harder to come by, I'm in the mood for salmon recipes that need a little marinating. If you are lucky enough to be in the Puget Sound area (or somewhere else where fresh, wild salmon is plentiful), you know that truly fresh salmon doesn't smell fishy. However, even the freshest fish, once frozen and defrosted, sometimes gets just a bit of that well known scent.

We buy almost all of our salmon from Wilson Fish. During the summer months, they sell salmon that's so fresh, they don't even want you to tell it that it's dead. Some days we are lucky enough to get fish that has been out of the water less than 36 hours.

While they were fishing this summer, and selling lots of fresh fish, they were also flash freezing King Salmon, Coho Salmon, and Halibut. You can still find them at the Ballard Farmers Market every Sunday, selling their frozen fish. We picked up a nice 3/4 pound Coho fillet the other day and our CSA box from Growing Washington contained a colorful bunch of Swiss Chard this week.

So last night, after a long day at work, we set about to make this recipe. 20 minutes later we were sitting down to a delicious, nutritious, and local dinner. The original recipe called for a salmon steak, but I often have trouble finding those at the market. Most of the fish we buy from Wilson's has the skin on. So I've included two sets of instructions. Use the bold version for a fillet and the italicized version for a steak.

Sauteed Swiss Chard and Salmon (adapted from Whole Foods)

Serves 2

• 3/4 to 1 lb salmon fillet or steak
• 1 bunch Swiss Chard
• 1-2 Tbsp sesame oil
• 1-2 Tbsp soy sauce (preferably low sodium)
• 1/2 an onion
• Splash of lemon juice (optional)

 

1. In a casserole dish or bowl large enough to hold the salmon, combine 1 Tbsp of the sesame oil and 1 Tbsp of the soy sauce.
2. If you've got a fillet, lay it skin side up in the dish and marinate for 10 minutes. If you've got a steak with no skin, cut it into 1 inch cubes and marinate for 10 minutes.
3. Meanwhile, separate the Swiss Chard leaves from the stems. The easiest way to do this is to fold the leaf in half lengthwise and pull the leaves off. Roughly chop the leaves and dice the stems into 1/2 inch pieces.
4. Dice or slice half an onion.
5. If you've got a salmon fillet, now is the time to throw it on the grill.
6. In a stir fry pan or wok, heat 1 Tbsp of the sesame oil over medium heat.
7. Cook the onions for 2 minutes.
8. Add the chard stems and cook for another 3 minutes.
9. Add the leaves and cook for another 2 minutes, until the leaves are moderately wilted.
10. If you've got cubes of salmon steak, remove the chard and onions from the pan, keep warm, and throw the salmon cubes and the marinating liquid into the pan. Cook for 3-5 minutes, or until the salmon is cooked through.
11. Serve the chard alongside the salmon and drizzle a small amount of lemon juice over the top. If you have extra cooking juices from either salmon or chard, you can drizzle those over the top as well.

Patricia's Notes: The strong flavor of the soy sauce helps cut any fishy flavor from frozen salmon. You can cook the chard for as long or as short as you want. I prefer my chard a little on the raw side, as fully wilted chard often tastes a bit bitter to me. The lemon juice just brightens up the flavors a bit, but you certainly don't need it. A bit of minced ginger would also go well in this dish. For a more dramatic presentation, sprinkle some sesame seeds over the top.

Thanksgiving is a holiday that focuses almost completely on food. The Thanksgiving dinner is usually full of tradition and of foods that most of the time, are not at all local. Let's look at a few typical Thanksgiving dinner menu items.

• Turkey: The vast majority of turkeys available in the grocery store are not raised organically or locally. One of the largest turkey suppliers in the U.S., Butterball, raises a large percentage of their turkeys in the Eastern United States. For those of us here in Seattle, that's definitely not local.
• Yams: Sure, you can get local sweet potatoes and yams, but those marshmallows? Not local at all.
• Mashed potatoes: We grow some of the best potatoes I've ever had here in Washington, but if you look for Russets in the grocery store, most of the time you don't even know where they were grown.
• Cranberry Sauce: Those bags of fresh cranberries at the grocery store often come from New England. While Ocean Spray (one of the largest producers of bagged cranberries) does have bogs in Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia, there's no guarantee that the bag you buy in the store came from anywhere local.
• Vegetables: In my house, the typical Thanksgiving vegetable was spinach and swiss cheese. Not only didn't I like it (I didn't like any cooked spinach growing up), it was made with frozen spinach. Definitely not local.
• Rolls: Flour and yeast don't tend to be local for very many people. White flour in particular can only be found from a couple local sources in the Pacific Northwest.
• Stuffing: Bags of bread crumbs and those little packets of spices are certainly easy, but definitely not local.
• Pumpkin Pie: If your house was anything like mine, Libby's Solid Pack Pumpkin was the typical main ingredient in your Thanksgiving dessert. Add to that a couple of cans of evaporated milk and you've got a very non-local dessert.

These are just a few generalized Thanksgiving Day dishes. Of course your typical dishes will vary and hopefully some of them are even local. However, if they aren't, and you want to try for a local Thanksgiving this year, Cook Local is going to provide you with some excellent recipes and resources. We'll try to stick to a 250 mile radius for our ingredients, but we will make small exceptions for salt, pepper, and a few spices.

If you have any particular Thanksgiving favorites that you'd like to make more local, let us know!

I remember, long before I started cooking local, prawns were one of my splurge dishes. I'd buy half a pound of them and mix up a batch of cocktail sauce. Throw a lettuce leaf in the bottom of the bowl, arrange half a dozen prawns on top, and serve with a dollop of sauce.

I still love prawns that way, but I rarely buy them these days. It isn't always easy to get them local. The prawns that you see in the supermarkets in Puget Sound are often from as far away as Australia. If you want a local source, though, you can usually find spot prawns at the Fisherman's Terminal during the week. Spot prawns are a west coast treasure. They aren't exactly prawns, or shrimp, but are available all the way from Southern California to Vancouver.

This recipe can be thrown together in less than twenty minutes. I used some fantastic cherry tomatoes from my CSA and fresh basil from my garden. You could easily replace the prawns with some leftover cooked chicken if you don't like seafood or can't find prawns locally.

Prawn Pasta with Balsamic-Marinated Tomatoes

Serves 2

• 1/2-3/4 pound spot prawns
• 1 pint cherry tomatoes
• Balsamic vinegar
• Olive oil
• Linguini
• Fresh basil
• 1/2 cup bread crumbs (preferably Panko)

1. In a large bowl, marinate the cherry tomatoes in some balsamic vinegar and olive oil. You can also add some sea salt.
2. Meanwhile, mix the breadcrumbs with some olive oil and toast in a small skillet until golden brown.
3. Set a pot of water to boil and cook the pasta. If your prawns are uncooked, throw them in during the last 3-4 minutes of the pasta cooking.
4. Drain the pasta and prawns and toss with the tomato mixture, some fresh, chopped basil, and some sea salt. Add extra olive oil as needed.
5. Top with the toasted breadcrumbs.

 

Patricia's Notes: This is the perfect recipe for a weeknight dinner. You can also cook the tomatoes with the olive oil and balsamic vinegar for about 5 minutes until a few of the tomatoes burst to give the dish a softer texture. The breadcrumbs serve as a nice contrast to the pasta, however they are optional.

A few weeks ago, John and I went to a farmers market feast. There were at least twenty different chefs from local restaurants who created delicious dishes with ingredients from local farms. One of the dishes we tried had julienned zucchini. Now I don't like zucchini. In fact, I downright hate zucchini. Or I did anyway. But since we had paid for the feast in whole and the dishes were all small, I tried those little matchsticks of squash. And you know what? I liked it. I'm not sure if it was the fact that the zucchini was extra small or if I have actually started to like those evil green logs, but here's the recipe I improvised shortly after this discovery.

NOTE: Some of the photos of this recipe are a bit... odd. Or rather, a bit... purple. There's a reason for this, and I'll explain along the way. Trust me, this was a fantastic dinner and one I'll definitely make again.

Ingredients

• 1 medium or 2 small zucchini
• 2 large carrots
• 1 pound Halibut
• 1 cup white wine
• 2 Tbsp butter

Directions

There are several ways to julienne vegetables. I used my mandoline slicer and the whole process took less than 5 minutes. Now, see those carrots? Those are Purple Haze carrots. They are a deep purple on the outside and bright orange on the inside. They are super sweet.

The problem? Or the effect these have? They turn EVERYTHING you cook purple. It's worse than red cabbage! We'll see the results of this a bit later.

Next, melt some butter in a large skillet (preferably not a non-stick skillet). Season the halibut with salt and pepper and cook it over medium-high heat until the bottom is opaque. Flip the halibut and repeat. At this point, the halibut should be about 3/4 cooked. Remove the fish from the pan and add the white wine. Deglaze the pan with a wooden spoon. Add the julienned veggies and saute for 5-7 minutes.

Add the halibut back into the pan and cook the entire thing for another 5 minutes, until the fish is completely cooked. Serve, seasoned with some salt and pepper.

 

Patricia's Notes: This really was a great meal, though it was a bit odd to look at. The purple haze carrots sort of leached their color into both the zucchini and the fish. The next time I make this, I'll definitely use your standard orange carrots. It didn't need a lot of seasoning, just some salt and pepper. The butter and white wine took care of the rest of the flavor. I ended up breaking the halibut into a couple of pieces when I flipped it and it was much easier to work with after that.

 For the past few weeks, we've been receiving absolutely delightful wax beans in our Growing Washington CSA box. I love fresh wax beans, in all colors (purple, green, and yellow recently). Usually I'll just steam them and serve them with a little butter, but John wanted something with a bit more kick the other night and so he found this delightful recipe from The Inquisitive Palate. We were  actually able to make this recipe completely local except for the ginger root and the salt and pepper, though we had to adapt it slightly.

Even if you follow the recipe to the letter, however, you can still come out ahead on the local scale since the majority of the ingredients are available from local farms and producers. Let's see what we need.

• 1 pound fresh wax beans: We got ours from Growing Washington, but they are available at any number of farm stands at the Seattle Farmers Markets.
• 4 ounces pork sausage: We splurged and bought Mangalitsa ground pork. You can use Skagit River Ranch's pork as well, or pork from Sea Breeze, but really, the Mangalitsa does have an amazing flavor.
• 3 scallions: These came from Growing Washington as well.
• 5 cloves of garlic: We got these from Anselmo Farms.
• 2-3 teaspoons of ginger root: This came from the grocery store and probably from Mexico.
• Hazelnut Oil: We get our hazelnut oil from Holmquists. The original recipe called for peanut oil though, which would also work very well.
• 10 dried chili peppers: One of the local farms last year sold bags of dried peppers. We bought several and have been using them up all winter and spring.
• 1/2 teaspoon peppercorns: The original recipe called for China Szechuan peppercorns, but we just used green peppercorns from the store.
• 1/4 cup dry Sherry: This wasn't local at all, though we left it out the first two times we made it and I'm not sure the dish really needed it.
• Salt

So, now that you know all about the ingredients, on to the recipe!

Trim the tops of the wax beans and if they are long, cut them in half.

Cut the scallions diagonally in one inch pieces.

Slice the garlic cloves and mince the ginger.

Cut the tops off of the chilies and if you don't like much heat, remove the seeds. I don't usually because this dish is really best when it is very spicy.

In a large skillet or wok, heat the oil over medium high heat. Add the wax beans and cook until the beans have started to caramelize and brown in spots. Remove the beans with a slotted spoon and add just a tad bit more oil.

Reduce the heat to medium. Add the garlic and ginger root and stir for a good solid minute. You'll know how long to cook them because the aroma they give off will be amazing. Add the chilies and the peppercorns and cook for another minute.

Now add the ground pork and stir frequently, breaking up the pork into small bits and cooking it until all of the pink is gone.

Turn the heat back up to medium high and add the wax beans back into the mix, along with the Sherry (if you're using). Cook for a minute or two longer, just to heat up the beans and reduce any liquid in the pan. Season with salt and serve!

Our notes: You can really have this dish as a complete meal. You only need two dishes, a cutting board, a knife, and a cooking spoon. Cook in the wok and have a large serving bowl ready to hold the beans while you are cooking the pork and then use that same dish for serving. If you are using Mangalitsa or Skagit River Ranch pork, you won't have a lot of fat and the fat you have will be healthier for you than the fat from the pork you get in the grocery store. So even though this dish is a bit greasy, it isn't at all heavy. Serve this with some crusty bread.

I'm actually getting tired of relying on my cookbooks. When you're a food writer as a side gig, you do a lot of cooking and you (I) can tend to get into a rut of relying on just a few of your favorite cookbooks for all of your recipes.

So lately we've tried to come up with our own recipes at least once or twice a month. So far we've been pretty successful. In fact, I'd say that the majority of recipes you'll see here over the next couple of weeks will actually be our own creations.

Tomatoes have been ripe and ready at the farmers markets for the past few weeks. One of our favorite vendors sells tomatoes easily the size of a coffee mug. They're HUGE! The first picture is actually one of the smaller tomatoes I've seen there and it's almost the size of my hand!

After staring at them for a few weeks, we decided to try to stuff them. We've experimented with stuffed peppers a few times. The stuffed cherry bombs worked out great, but stuffing a pepper with much other than cheese (or maybe bacon) just doesn't do it for us. So we figured, why not tomatoes?

We set about looking for a few other ingredients.

First, we went to Skagit River Ranch and got some hot Italian sausage.

Next, we picked up some purple peppers.

After that, some garlic and onions.

Lastly, we went over to one of the Artisan cheese vendors, Estrella Creamery. We picked up some provolone style cheese from them and we were on our way.

Then there is some chopping, some cooking, some stuffing, and some eating.

But since you'll probably want a little more info than that, here's what you'll need.

Stuffed Tomatoes a la Eddy

• 4 large tomatoes
• 3-4 hot Italian sausage
• 1-2 purple peppers
• 5 cloves of garlic
• 1 medium sweet onion
• 1/4 pound Provolone cheese

 

1. Use your GarlicZoom to mince the garlic.
2. Dice the onions and peppers.
3. Take the sausage out of its casing.
4. Cook in a large skillet until it is no longer pink. If you're using pastured pork, or are lucky enough to have Skagit River Ranch sausage, don't drain the fat - that is if you can even find fat. Otherwise, you might want to drain a little bit off.
5. Add the peppers, onions, and garlic and cook for another few minutes.
6. Remove from heat and cool slightly in a bowl.
7. With a paring knife, cut the top off of each tomato and hollow out as much of the inside as you can. Be careful not to cut through the skin, particularly on the bottom.
8. Take 4 slices of the provolone and reserve them.
9. Cube the rest of the cheese and mix in with the sausage mixture.
10. Stuff the tomatoes.
11. Grill them in a grill pan (or bake) for approximately 10-15 minutes.
12. Place the slices of provolone on top of the tomatoes and grill until the cheese has melted.

This recipe was a big success. Unlike stuffed peppers, which don't impart a lot of flavor to their stuffing and are generally extremely dry, these tomatoes were moist and incredibly flavorful. I don't even like to eat tomatoes in their whole, non-sauced form, and I think I ate every bite of both the tomato and the stuffing. I'm not sure what else could have made this recipe better. Next time I might add some minced hot peppers as well as the bell peppers (or maybe even instead of).

It's Memorial Day Weekend and the weather is supposed to be decent, though not warm. The last of the parsnips are still available at the local farmers markets, so I present one last winter recipe.

This is another recipe that can be made with just about all local ingredients. I do recommend using salt and pepper, which I have yet to find produced locally. Originally, this recipe came from the Amateur Gourmet who took the recipe from Molly Stevens' All About Braising. I adapted it slightly.

Cider Braised Chicken with Hard Cider and Parsnips
(Adapted from Molly Stevens' All About Braising)
Serves 4

Ingredients

• 2 teaspoons hazelnut or olive oil (optional)
• 4 thick slices of bacon (ours was from Skagit River Ranch)
• 3 pounds chicken breasts or thighs (from Rickman Gulch)
• Salt and pepper
• 1 large shallot
• 2 1/2 cups hard cider (from Rockridge Orchards)
• 1 tablespoon fresh rosemary
• 1 pound parsnips

1. Prepare the ingredients by mincing the shallot, dicing the bacon, and chopping the rosemary. Peel the parsnips and cut them into sticks. Larger parsnips will have a woody core that should be discarded.
2. In a large, oven safe pan, saute the bacon until crispy. The original recipe calls for cooking the bacon in the oil, but I've found this is usually unnecessary.
3. Remove the bacon with a slotted spoon and transfer it to a paper towel lined plate. 
4. Preheat the oven to 325.
5. Rinse the chicken pieces and pat dry. Season with salt and pepper and brown them on all sides in the same pan over medium-high heat. If you are using skin-on chicken pieces, brown the skin side first until crispy.
6. Transfer the browned chicken to a plate and set aside.
7. Add the shallot and saute, stirring often to prevent burning. Add 2 cups of the hard cider and deglaze the pan, scraping up any browned bits on the bottom of the pan.
8. Boil and reduce the cider to approximately 1/2 cup, about 10-15 minutes.
9. Add the rosemary and the last 1/2 cup of cider and reduce again until there is about 3/4 cup of liquid left in the pan.
10. Add the parsnips and some salt and pepper. Crumble the bacon over the parsnips and then add the chicken. If you're using skin-on chicken, the pieces should be skin side down.
11. Place a piece of parchment paper over the pan and cover with a lid. Bake for 25 minutes.
12. Turn the chicken pieces and make sure the liquid isn't boiling too rapidly. If it is at a rolling boil, turn the oven down 10-15 degrees.
13. Bake for another 20-25 minutes until the thickest chicken piece is done and the parsnips are fork tender.
14. Remove the chicken and transfer the pan back to the stove. Over medium-high heat, boil the sauce for another minute or two to thicken it slightly.
15. Plate the chicken and arrange the parsnips and sauce over it.

Patricia's Notes: I don't usually use chicken with the skin for this recipe. It adds just a bit more fat than I'd like and the recipe really doesn't need it. I do often use chicken thighs as they are a bit better suited to long, slow cooking, although breasts work just fine. The parsnips absorb the sweet tang of the cider and the saltiness of the bacon. The chicken should be practically falling apart by the time the dish is done.