Bashed Lemon and Dill Chicken

I was going to be making some things that were in the freezer today, but apparently when The Man says, "You cook whatever you want." He really means, "If I don't want what you tell me what you are making, I'm going to vote against it, even though I loved the recipe when you made it before." And bring up unfounded concerns that The Son will have problems with it as well. (What's a little tummy trouble when the food is that good?)

In all fairness, his objection did save us from leftovers; and allowed me to be a bit more inventive than tossing some stuff in a pan. And I guess he does have work tomorrow, so tummy troubles would be unpleasant.

Once I got past my sleep-deprived irritation over the situation and found his objection to be completely reasonable, out came the thinking cap.

So, we're having chicken. Again. How do you feed two adults and a nine-year-old with just two chicken breasts? You get creative.

Today we're having bashed lemon and dill chicken; the recipe is out of my head. Just like the Sour Cherry Sauce was from my head. Ooooo two in a row. You lucky, lucky people.

You will need:

• 2 Chicken Breasts
• Sea Salt
• Cracked Pepper
• Zest of 1 Lemon
• About 1 tsp of Dill
• Olive Oil

Get your pan good and hot, and put in 1-2 Tbsp olive oil.

Lay a piece of parchment paper, twice the length of your board out.

Put the chicken on the paper and season with the salt and pepper. Sprinkle on the dill and lemon zest.

Drag the breast all around and make sure that both sides are nicely seasoned.

Fold the paper up over your chicken, like a little blanket.

Using a rolling pin, smack it a bit. This will bash in the flavour and thin the breasts a little so that cooking goes nice and fast.

Put the breasts in the pan. Cook a few minutes on each side until nicely golden. They shouldn't take very long to cook, and you don't want to overcook them, so if you feel like you need to check, cut open the thickest area and have a peek.

For our dinner, I've sliced the breasts up and laid them on a bed of lemon couscous with grilled carrots and peppers. Brilliant.

That's my taste on it.

Yummy Sour Cherry Sauce

There are about a hundred bajillion ways to cook chicken; roasted chicken, BBQ chicken, grilled chicken, steamed chicken, fried chicken, baked chicken, boiled chicken, stuffed chicken ... the list just goes on and on and on. The trick is to keep it interesting; quite the trick indeed.

When I was pregnant I ate a lot of frozen fruit. Berries, grapes, cherries. I wouldn't thaw it because I was also craving ice, so I'd just suck on the frozen berries. My Mom gave me a big freezer bag of frozen sour cherries that I never made it through. Maybe because there were so many of them, maybe because they were super sour. Super, super sour.

So for today's dinner I made a lovely sour cherry sauce to dress the chicken.

• About 2 big cups Sour Cherries, pits removed
• 1/8 cup Brown Sugar
• 2-3 Tbsp Balsamic Vinegar
• 1 Tbsp Cornstarch, optional

In a small pot, heat the cherries on medium heat. When they start to get soft, mash 'em up with a fork. You can remove the skins if you want, but I didn't.

Add your brown sugar and vinegar and stir.

Adjust to taste as you like.

If you want a thicker sauce, add the cornstarch. Bring to a boil, stirring occasionally. Then reduce the heat.

Allow to simmer for a while. Like any sauce, the more time it has to bond, the better. 

I found that the sauce was still a bit sour, but the brown sugar took the edge off. The balsamic vinegar gave it just a touch of zang and it was really quite nice; especially with all the little chunks of cherry that I left in.

For our dinner, I cut the chicken into strips and steamed them in my wonderful bamboo steamer; best $14 I ever spent. Once they were done, I plated with pan fried (homemade) gnocchi--I'll put up a post for those soon--and some steamed veggies. We drizzled the sauce over the chicken.

The result? Yummy! 

I plan on putting some of the leftover sauce in my oatmeal tomorrow morning. Oatmeal is so boring by itself. It needs a buddy, and I think that this will work well. I guess we'll see.

That's my taste on it.

Also, I just realized how boring my plates are. I really should do something about that.