Spicy Cranberry Glazed Chicken for Crazy Ingredient Challenge

This month our Crazy Ingredient Challenge host, Dawn, chose cranberries and shallots. Well, we actually voted on a set of ingredients provided by Dawn. Cranberries and shallots won. I had never worked with cranberries or shallots before and I kinda stared at the ingredients on the page for a long while. Certainly, I could not make dessert. Or could I? A quick bread? A galette? A galette would be amazing. I had never made one before. How close in flavour to onions were shallots? Were they sweet? Sharper bite? What to expect? It's a little harder to plan a dish when you have no idea what the flavours are like. Eventually, I decided to just keep it simple and make something that I would want to eat for dinner. I really loved this and I hope that if you try it, you will too.

Spicy Cranberry Glazed Chicken 

Ingredients
6 pieces of chicken (I used drumsticks)
seasoned salt and pepper to taste.
1 can jellied cranberry sauce
1 shallot, finely minced
2 cloves garlic, finely minced
1/4 -1/2 scotch bonnet or habanero pepper, chopped
1/2 teaspoon ginger
1/2 teaspoon paprika
1/2 teaspoon cumin


Directions

Season the generously chicken with seasoned salt and pepper.  Allow to sit for at least an hour.
Preheat oven to 400 F.
In a small saucepan combine all the remaining ingredients over medium heat. Stir from time to time as the jellied cranberry sauce melts.

Put the chicken pieces in a foil lined baking pan and place in the oven. After 10 minutes reduce the oven temperature to 350 F and brush the chicken pieces with the spicy cranberry sauce. Keep basting and turning the chicken pieces every 10 minutes until the chicken is completely cooked - ~ 40 minutes.

An InLinkz Link-up

Cherry Carrot & Banana Bundt for #Bundt Bakers.

I have been craving carrot cake for months. It's one of my favourite cakes - second to the great chocolate. But each time something would happen and I'd bake something other than carrot. Banana was the latest cake to take over my brain and I made a banana cake from Food52. While I enjoyed it, there were changes that I wanted to make (way too small!). And suddenly it was a carrot vs banana tug of war. I simply could not choose. And that's a long way of telling you how I decided to add cherries to a carrot banana cake for this month's Bundt Bakers. The cravings made me do it.

This cake is more "bread-like" than "cake-like". It's extremely moist from the bananas, fresh cherries and carrots. I just could not stop eating it.Normally, most of a cake goes straight to my freezer and I eat pieces for a little while. This never made it to the freezer. Breakfast. Lunch. Dinner. Snacks. Passing by the kitchen. I was nibbling. If I made this again, I'd use dried cherries instead of fresh ones - all that chopping was no fun. Plus, I think I'd love the contrast of tart cherries here.

Oh, I should address the lack of a frosting. I love carrot cake plus cream cheese frosting and I am sure that banana cake plus cream cheese frosting is amazing too. However, I just could not convince myself to make one. If you make this and you love cream cheese frosting, I say go for it. Make it a spicy one. I was happy without it (and it definitely made eating it for breakfast easier) but I would also be happy with it. 

Felice at All That's Left are Crumbs chose stone fruits for us this month. Look what the other Bundt Bakers made:

• All-American Chocolate Cherry Pie Cake from Lauren at Sew You Think You Can Cook
• Black Forest Bundt Cake with Cherry Ganache Topping from Teri at The Freshman Cook 
• Cherry Almond Ginger Bundt from Jane at Jane’s Adventures in Dinner 
• Cherry Carrot & Banana Bundt from Kelly at Passion Kneaded 
• Cherry Chocolate Chip Bundt Cake from Renee at Magnolia Days 
• Chocolate Avocado Bundt Cake from Terri at Love and Confections 
• Cinnamon Peach Bundt Cake from Bea and Mara at I Love Bundts 
• Peaches n Cream Melba Bundt Cake from Laura at Baking in Pyjamas 
• Peachy Bundt from Margaret at Tea and Scones 
• Plum, Chocolate and Orange Bundt Cake by Maria at Box of Stolen Socks 
• Roasted Cherry Kugelhopf with Cherry Bourbon Glaze by Tux from Brooklyn Homemaker
• Upside-down Apricot Butter Bundt from Stacy at Food Lust People Love

#BundtBakers is a group of Bundt loving bakers who get together once a month to bake Bundts with a common ingredient or theme.  Follow our Pinterest board right here. Links are also updated each month on the BundtBakers home page.

We take turns hosting each month and choosing the theme/ingredient.

If you are a food blogger and would like to join us, just send Stacy an email with your blog URL to foodlustpeoplelove@gmail.com.



 Cherry Chocolate & Banana Bundt 

Ingredients

2 cups all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ginger
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
pinch of ground nutmeg
pinch of ground cloves
3 large eggs
1 cup granulated sugar
1/2 butter, melted and cooled
1 cup bananas (~ 2 large), mashed
1/4 cup yogurt
1/4 cup milk
2 cups grated carrots
1 cup chopped fresh cherries

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 F.
Thoroughly grease and flour a 10-12 cup Bundt pan.
Whisk together flour, baking soda, salt, ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg and clove. In another bowl, beat eggs and sugar until pale and frothy then pour in the melted butter and bananas.

Add half the flour mixture and mix until almost combined - there should still be streaks of flour. Add the yogurt and milk and the second half of the flour mixture - again mixing until almost combined. Fold in the carrots and cherries - mixing only until just combined.

Place in preheated oven and bake for  50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the cake comes out clean.