It’s hard to believe that, for as old as I am, and for what a crazed food-obsessed person that I am, I’ve never tasted jerk style chicken until this year, when my better half found a bottle of his favorite jerk marinade at a market and offered to make dinner, cradling the bottle like a newborn baby.

What?!? Dinner?!? Of course I will jump at the opportunity for anyone to make me a meal. I love being cooked for, even if it’s just an egg and a dry piece of toast. But when I found out that he was making me his famous jerk chicken wrap, inspired by a particularly memorable street festival food cart in his youth, I sat patiently and waited for dinner. Is it authentic? I have no idea, but what it is is flatout delicious! I gobbled this wrap up quickly, only to wish another flatbread would appear before me, filled with spicy grilled chicken, cool lettuce leaves, and a squirt of mayonnaise. Street food without the street, at your beck and call, as long as you have the marinade.

He likes to marinate the chicken for as long as possible before grilling it (his preferred cooking method) and allow everyone to build their own flatbread wraps just the way they like it. He piles all the ingredients on a big platter with red onion slices, so people just help themselves and fill up their own flatbread. The concept is simple, and the end product is unbelievably good. A rare and wonderful dinner, all thanks to my dear better half, who introduced me to jerk marinade.

-Amy at Flatout

Mouths are drooling over this recipe by the talented Vanessa Mota of Smart Little Cookie, using our flatbread as the perfect quesadilla, if we do say so ourselves. Take our word for it: red onions and scallions take this quesadilla from fabulous to over the top! Thanks, Vanessa!

Whenever I leave the house to run errands, especially if it involves a lot of pesky traffic and running around from one place to another, for some reason I come back famished. Maybe it’s the city drivers. Maybe it’s the eternal schlepping back and forth I have to do. Maybe it’s just being around so many people, but this hunter gatherer gets hungry and crabby! I need a snack, pronto, something that I can share with my better half and that won’t spoil my dinner. Of course, if it’s dinnertime, I will just make two, one for each of us, and load up on delicious toppings, salsas, and avocados with which to eat this simple flatbread quesadilla.

This flatbread recipe comes in handy on those days when I need a little protein boost and a lot of flavor without a lot of fanfare and work in the kitchen. Making your quesadillas with beans you cook yourself can save a lot of money and significantly reduce your grocery bill, too. A single can of cooked beans can sometimes cost more than a one pound bag of dried beans, which when cooked can keep an entire family in flatbread quesadillas for awhile.

If you do cook your own beans, you can control the amount of sodium you’re using, too. Many canned beans are ridiculously high in sodium. Instead, try flavoring your beans as they cook with a bay leaf, cloves of garlic, some cumin, dried chiles, an onion, or some oregano. Don’t salt the beans until they are tender and cooked through, however, because adding salt before then can prevent the beans from softening.

Once the beans are finished, strain them and put them in the food processor, puréeing them until smooth. This purée can be seasoned the way you like it, using spices, salt, hot sauce, garlic, broth, and olive oil, and stored in your refrigerator so you have everything you need (don’t forget the flatbread) to make these quick and easy quesadillas if you return home and you need a fast bite, weary from the world. Call it grouch control.

Amy at Flatout

I’m kicking it old school with this flatbread salad wrap recipe, and that’s not a bad thing. It’s raining here, so I’ve been stuck inside thumbing through a stack of old cookbooks, mostly vintage ladies’ clubs fundraising cookbooks, which are my personal favorites, typos, corrections, and all.

Home cooking is such a wonderful tradition. Obviously borne out of necessity, it’s still the best way to show love and care for a spouse, a family, or friends. I love to think about all the generations of women who have held on to their own recipes so dearly, passing on a favorite here or there, sharing a great one in a little cookbook that would be carefully hand typed, published on a mimeograph machine, bound with a plastic spiral, and sold to raise money for a club or church. I never pass up these little treasures at rummage sales, because who knows what gem of a recipe I may find? I have definitely adapted a number of recipes to work with flatbread, to great success!

When we travel, I like to pick up old fundraising cookbooks as souvenirs. It’s a great way to get a feel for regional cuisine and even get a taste (pun intended) of regional history. They don’t take up a lot of room in the suitcase or the shelf, either, once you get them home.

Anyways, this recipe takes a page from one of those old books. It’s a classic chicken salad made with grapes and nuts and a little bit of yogurt (instead of sour cream) to lighten up the salad for today’s diets. It’s the perfect thing to roll up into a flatbread, and pack in a picnic basket or serve outside with some lemonade or iced tea. Or lemonade and iced tea, if you like Arnold Palmers.
If you have tarragon, please use it. A little of this delicious herb goes a long way to make this classic chicken salad a recipe to hold onto, and maybe pass down to a friend or relative, if you’re feeling generous…….

Amy at Flatout