One Pot Pasta

It's ALL the rage - short quick videos of recipes, and even better - make your meal in one pot! No pesky additional pots to clean!

I've done it. A pasta purist would probably cringe, as I poured dried pasta on top of cooked vegetables and chicken, and added barely enough water to cover, let it come to a boil, then drain off my excess liquid, add cream and cheese, and voila, dinner.  But hey, I only had to clean one (massive) pot and I kinda like the result.

This recipe is adapted from Tasty's One Pot Cajun Pasta to my tastes because I don't like spicy food.  Never feel beholden to a recipe word for word - I adapted the recipe to my needs.  Also because I don't really like bell peppers.

only the finest of dinnerware, from the dixie collection

One Pot Pasta adapted from Tasty's One Pot Cajun Pasta

Serves approximately four.

Ingredients:

• One chicken breast, cubed (cut it as small as you'd like)
• 8 ounces of mushrooms (I use crimini)
• Half of a medium onion, sliced and sliced in half again
• Any other vegetable you'd like to throw in (pictured is kale because it was on sale, but I also recommend asparagus, or you can use bell peppers)
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 8 oz pasta (cavatappi pictured)
• 1 cup chicken broth
• 1.5 cups water
• 0.5 cups cream (I use half and half)
• 1/2-2/3 cup of parmesan cheese
• Salt and pepper
• Dried oregano

Directions:

1. Using a large pot (I have a 4.5 quart Le Creuset) warm up the pot on the stove.
2. With one teaspoon of oil, cook mushrooms and onions together until browned. Remove from pot.
3. Throw in vegetables and brown (or if using kale, until wilted), and remove from pot
4. With a teaspoon of oil, add garlic.  Add chicken. Season with salt, pepper and 1 teaspoon of dried oregano.  Cook until no longer pink-ish.
5. Re-add all vegetables to the pot.
6. Add pasta.
7. Add chicken broth and water.  (add enough to only just cover the pasta. Do not submerge the pasta. That is too much liquid.)  Try to scrape the bottom of the pot.  
8. Cover and bring to a boil.  Stir for as long as it takes pasta to cook (cavatappi took 12 minutes.)  Liquid should reduce as you stir.
9. Remove excess broth with a ladle - you want it to be slightly wet but not overly wet, if that makes sense.  There should be about 1/4th cup of liquid left in the pot.  The excess broth should be delicious.
10. Add cream (or half and half) and stir in.
11. Add parmesan cheese slowly and stir to combine. Continue adding until sauce thickens.  It should start getting cheesy gooey stringy but not quite mac and cheese gooey.  
12. Serve!

Garlic Chicken Legs

I stock chicken in my freezer regularly - I buy it when it's on sale or when I catch it on clearance.  (It's FINE when it's on clearance - either use it that day or freeze it.  It's on the last day of the sell-by date on the sticker.)

I needed to "de-stash" my freezer a bit, so I pulled out this recipe I've been sitting on for the chicken legs.  The recipe originally called for wings, but I figured a bit of adaptation never hurt anyone.

Today's recipe is from Everyday Chinese Cooking by Leeann and Katie Chin.  If you're from Minnesota, you've heard of the Leeann Chin restaurants - the Panda Express of Minnesota, if you would.  (They also recently purchased Pick Up Stix, which I ate at a few times in Southern California.)  The premise of the book is that Chinese cooking isn't that difficult or exotic - a few simple directions, ingredients anyone can find, and you are on your way.

I had always picked out this recipe with the intention to make it with either legs or thighs, but Mr. Unoriginal Chef said it would probably be better on wings... and that this was similar to a recipe his grandma made when he was a kid.  Go figure.  Every time I find an Asian recipe, it reminds one of us of our childhoods.

This recipe is extremely easy - the hardest part was adjusting the cooking time.  If you're using legs, I'd recommend 50 minutes.  At 40 minutes it wasn't quite done yet, according to my meat thermometer.  I left it in the oven for another 15 minutes, and it blew past done.  It wasn't dry though, which was fortunate!  Even reheated the next day for lunch, it was still tender.

Quick tip:  I forgot I didn't have a fresh bottle of ketchup, so I substituted with ketchup packets.  So in a pinch, 2 packets of ketchup is about 1 tablespoon.

Hellooooo hot out of the oven goodness!

Garlic Chicken Wings by Leeann and Katie Chin

Ingredients:

• 12 chicken wings (I used three chicken legs)
• 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
• 2 teaspoons soy sauce
• 1/4 cup ketchup (or 8 ketchup packets)
• 1 teaspoon minced garlic (I finely minced two cloves)
• 1 teaspoon minced fresh ginger (I added a few dashes of ground ginger)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt (table salt)
• 1 teaspoon sugar

Directions:

1.  Cut the chicken wings at the joints to make 3 pieces.  Reserve the tips to use in broth.

2.  In a small bowl, mix the vegetable oil, soy sauce, ketchup, garlic, ginger, salt and sugar.  Pour over the wings and marinate 1 to 2 hours in the refrigerator.  Minimum marinating time:  30 minutes.

I marinate inside a ziploc bag for ease of cleanup later.  

3.  When ready to bake, preheat the oven to 400F.

4.  Line a shallow roasting pan (I used a 8x8 Pyrex) with foil for easy cleanup.  Add the chicken to the pan, and bake 40-55 minutes, or when a thermometer inserted in the thickest part, without hitting the bone, hits 180 degrees.

Really simple, basic ingredients, super easy, super yummy.

There were three legs... um... we ate one pretty quickly after it came out of the oven.  We couldn't help ourselves.

Pan Fried Lemon Chicken Bites

After two days of ravioli, I needed to change up my menu and find another use for my pomodoro sauce.

I decided regular pasta would be fine, but I needed a protein to go with it.  What's a good, quick, but lunch friendly protein dish I could make?  The second part of the challenge - it also had to hold up pretty well before I ate it for lunch.

There's a website for that!  Enter Just Bento!  Just Bento is run by Maki, who provides ideas about how to make bento style lunches for lunch that are not only good for you but delicious.  Her recipes can be found on her other website, Just Hungry.  By the way, Maki has a new adorable book out called The Just Bento Cookbook.

I somehow came across the recipe for Pan Fried Lemon Chicken Nuggets and I loved how simple the recipe was and knew it was perfect for a quick weeknight dish.  I had all the ingredients on hand, making life simple.  I defrosted my chicken overnight (unfortunately it was slightly frozen, so I cooked it longer) and had half of the chicken for dinner, and the other half went with my lunch.

The amount of time you marinate the chicken (plus starting with unfrozen chicken would help) will develop a much deeper lemon flavor in the nuggets, however, drizzling lemon juice on the chicken also gave it that extra lemon burst.  No, it's not exactly like the lemon chicken from Chinese restaurants, but it's a good, quick alternative you can make at home.  Just the way I like it.

Gimme a little cocktail fork and I'm good to go.

Heck, you can probably even serve them as an appetizer at a party.  Or snack on them as they come out of the frying pan.

One note about frying though - I would use the smallest pan you have, just to make your life easier, and so that the oil creates a layer on the bottom of the pan.  If you just drizzle, it tends to collect in one side of the pan versus the other, and your chicken doesn't fry evenly.

Pan-fried Lemon Chicken Bites from Just Bento

Ingredients:

• About 10.5 ounces of boneless, skinless chicken breast (I used breast tenderloins)
• Salt and pepper
• Cornstarch (approximately 1/3 cup)
• One whole lemon
• 1-2 tablespoons of olive oil (more if needed)

Directions:

1.  Using paper towels, wipe the chicken dry and cut into bite sized pieces.  In a bowl, season with salt, pepper, and the juice of half a lemon.  Toss well, and set aside for at least five minutes.

2.  Heat up a pan with the oil.

3.  Drain the chicken and coat in cornstarch.  

4.  Pan-fry in the frying pan until brown and crispy, about 3-4 minutes, and turn over.  Repeat on the other side, about 2-3 minutes.  Drain on paper towels and repeat until the chicken is cooked.  I always pull a piece out and rip it in half to make sure it is cooked through.  

5.  Optional:  Drizzle soy sauce over the chicken to give it a caramel color.  

6.  Squeeze the other half of the lemon over the chicken.  Let cool if you will be packing it for lunch, or serve hot and eat it right away.  Or while you're cooking them...

Served with whole wheat pasta, pomodoro sauce, and some lemon.  Yums.