After two days of bed rest, I finally felt a bit better last night and decided to make some of my world famous fried chicken using the cornish cross we butchered recently.

The recipe is one I learned from my mom who learned it from hers and it is simple but delicious:

• Two chicken breasts
• Olive oil*
• Salt, Pepper & Garlic powder
• Flour
• Two eggs

I use a few tbs of oil in a skillet on the stove and heat it to medium high. I scramble the eggs and dip the chicken breasts in the egg mixture before coating them liberally with flour and then add the salt, pepper and garlic to season them on both sides.

*There is a secret ingredient, here. Instead of my regular olive oil, I used my homemade rosemary infused olive oil and it added just a hint of rosemary to the chicken. 🙂

Because the chicken breasts we use are so thick, I fry them until both sides are browned…

…and then transfer them to an oven safe dish and finish them off by baking them in my convection oven at 375F for 10-15 minutes or until the meat thermometer reads 175F.

Then I let them sit for five minutes before serving.

That’s it. Simple but yummy!

We cooked up some of the sweet corn we harvested to go with it and I also got to try out my new Cuisinart bread machine I bought since I wore out my last one…

It works like a charm, takes up less counter space and has a much better viewing window than my last one. I used a basic white bread recipe for the bread:

• 1 1/3 cups warm water
• 3 tbs olive oil
• 3 tbs sugar
• 1 1/2 tsp salt
• 3 3/4 cups flour (sifted)
• 2 tsp bread machine yeast

There is a secret to getting it to come out just right, too. Add the water, then the oil, salt and sugar first. Then add the sifted flour and make a little “nest” or depression in it for the yeast to go into.

Sifted flour is a must, it makes all the difference in the quality of the bread, too!

I set it to medium crust and a 2lb white bread loaf so it took about 3 hours to bake.

Everything came out absolutely perfect, and we topped it off with some pumpkin pie which we ate by lamplight because my eyes are not fully recovered so bright lights are off limits still…

I’m not sure what set off this latest mast attack, although I suspect the fact that I got out and did so much last week pushed me over the edge and overloaded my donkey, so to speak. Either way, I lost a couple days and will need a couple more to get back to feeling “normal” again.

In the meantime, I have no choice but to take it easy until every last mast cell calms the heck back down.

Grrr.

Luckily I have tons of blogs to read and plenty of company to keep me warm…

…and to help me with any leftovers! 😄