Skewered Chicken with Blackberry Sauce

Day 14-I’ll start out by saying sometimes I can be a complainer. Sometimes that complaining is not validated. There are other times it is. I have a beef to pick with Wegmans. I know it’s almost impossible for you Wegmans-is-like-a-higher-god people to believe. This is not the first time I’ve had a complaint about Wegmans, and I’m sure it won’t be the last. I’m a pessimist.

My story starts with the fact that grocery shopping is a chore for me. I find no enjoyment in it (sometimes if I get a free sample and it’s tasty, there is a little joy). While I love food, I wouldn’t mind having it shipped to my house and never stepping foot into a grocery store again. I am also a list maker. I stick to my lists and very rarely do I buy anything not on the list, unless it’s something I remember I need while shopping. I want to get in and out as fast as possible. If I forget to buy something I get very cranky.

Sunday I was took my normal trip to the grocery stores, Aldi’s and Wegmans. Aldi’s is my go to place for certain items like yogurt, tortilla chips, and cheese. They are cheaper there and just as delicious. Wegmans is typically good for all my fresh ingredients and specialty items like my ethnic ingredients. I trust Wegmans a little more with my fresh items then other places. So putting my trust into Wegmans, I bought produce there for tonight’s recipe, a container of blackberries. After a quick glance at the container I deemed the berries as okay. As I stated earlier these grocery shopping trips need to be fast; the longer I am there the more agitated I get.

I was excited to cook tonight’s recipe. It sounded very gourmet, Skewered Chicken with Blackberry Sauce, not your everyday weeknight meal. I prepped the chicken and left it to marinate in white wine, fresh chopped rosemary, and black pepper for an hour. Once the hour was up I got the chicken pieces onto the skewers and put them in the oven to broil. Next I had to make the blackberry sauce. I needed to put the blackberries into a saucepan with the marinade and get them soft. I opened the container and started taking the blackberries out. The first couple looked normal, the next one had a little bit of mold at the top so I cut it off. No big deal. I grabbed the next one and it was covered in mold. WTH?! I looked into the container and moved some berries aside and realized all the ones in the bottom of the container were pretty moldy. I couldn’t have been more upset. I know mold is an easy issue to deal with since it’s pretty much only on the surface. There was no way I was going to run to the store now with the chicken already in the oven. So I sorted through and picked out all the berries where I could easily cut away the mold. I was not a happy camper though.

I trust Wegmans to use all the employees that are always standing around in the produce department wisely. They should be going through all the produce and making sure it’s still suitable to be bought and used by their customers. Apparently they do not do this. I mentioned this to Anthony and he said they can’t be expected to go through everything, but I disagree. If they are all about quality and service then this shouldn’t be too big of a job for them and they should want to do this. There is no way they have touched those berries in days. I bought them Sunday (from the top of the pile mind you) and used them Monday. How could they have gone moldy overnight? There is no way! This is not the first time I’ve bought something and in my rush to get out, not noticed it was bad. It’s almost always happened at Wegmans. Top quality products? I’m not so sure anymore. I could blame myself for hating shopping and just wanting to get out as soon as possible, but I don’t think all the blame can be put on me. And in closing that’s my beef with Wegmans. I’m probably not the only person with this beef. Let me know if you’ve had similar issues.

Once I accepted the fact that I was going to have to use the good parts of the moldy berries, I moved on. I softened the berries and put them into a strainer and pushed on them with a wooden spoon to extract the juice. I mean I guess this is the point, the recipe doesn’t really say what we are trying to get from these softened berries. Then you put the juice back into the saucepan with a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar, 2 tablespoons of red currant jelly and a ¼ teaspoon of nutmeg. You leave it boil and reduce it about 1/3.

All of this, minus the moldy berries sounds like it should have tasted divine. Ah…not so much. The chicken came out dry, this might have been because of my need to make sure chicken is seriously cooked (I’ve had food poisoning from chicken a few times). There was way too much rosemary. I found another blog that had used this same recipe and someone else commented on there being too much rosemary. So I would cut that down to 1 tablespoon. The other problem was the sauce. It didn’t really taste like much. It seems like this is a common complaint and people have spiced it up with orange juice and red wine vinegar. Another person used habaneros and someone else changed the recipe and used raspberries with some honey to sweeten it up. Any of these changes sound good to me depending on the taste you are going for. I think it I try it again I will go the spicier route. Of course that is if I ever buy berries from Wegmans again. I might have to get them at the Farmer’s Market instead or even frozen.

Final Product:

Totals: 5 minutes prep, 1 hour marinate, 15 mins cooking time,1 bowl, 1 saucepan, 1 strainer, 1 broiler pan.

The produce I’m using tonight better look healthy or I will be complaining to Wegmans. Some of you are not yet aware of my food being “bad” hang-ups. I will let you in on my fear in a later blog installment. It’s not pretty.