Chicken Scallopini with a twist!

(This is The Pioneer Woman's luscious pic that totally enticed me to cook this meal, over & over again)

In case you hadn't heard I am a HUGE fan of The Pioneer Woman, Ree Drummond. I love her down to earth country ranch style cooking, and her easy step by step photos are mouth wateringly gorgeous. Last year a friend an I were cooking our way through her website The Pioneer Woman - Chicken Scallopine which was alot of fun, I was out at my parents so it was easy as the recipes are usually quite generous in servings, so it feed 3 with leftovers usually or if my brother and his partner came over it fed us all to a T.

This is a very simple recipe to cook, and really really yummy, but I confess I am a mushy (mushroom) lover so that had a big influence on my votes to this one up.

By all means halve this recipe if only feeding 3-4 people.

Chicken Scallopini with a Twist

500g Packet of Linguini
4-6 Chicken Breasts
Salt & Pepper to season
1 Cup Flour
2 Tbsp Olive Oil
4 Tbsp Butter
300g (approx 2-3 cups) Mushrooms - sliced
1 cup Dry White Wine
Chicken Stock (optional)
1 whole Lemon
1/2 cup Thickened Cream (can use light or cooking cream)
2 Tbsp Parsley - chopped
Parmesan Cheese - to serve

Put a large pot of salted water on the stove top with the heat on high to get to the boil for the pasta.

Next slice and de-giblet your chicken breasts into thinner pieces and using a mallet or rolling pin to tenderise the breast between 2 plastic sheets or freezer bags, another option is to place them into ziplock bags.

Once you have your thin tenderised chicken breasts, place flour, salt and pepper into a freezer (plastic) bag, place one piece of chicken at a time into the bag and shake well, coating the chicken well. When all the chicken is coated, place them onto a dinner plate and into the fridge for half an hour for best results.

Heat a large frypan on stove top with the olive oil and butter in the plan, once melted/heated place the chicken into the fry pan and brown the chicken well on each side, this will only take approx 3-4 minutes each side as the chicken is very thin.  Remove from the pan and place the cooked chicken breasts onto a seperate plate preferably with a couple of pieces of paper towel, to assist in draining the oil off the chicken.

The butter and oil will be brown, toss in the sliced mushrooms, stir them around coating them in butter. Once all coated nicely in the butter and oil, pour in the cup of white wine (this can be substituted with chicken stock).  Next squeeze half a lemon into the pan over the mushrooms. Make sure its a juicy one, if not then squeeze in the other half, I find microwaving a lemon for 10 seconds always helps to make it pliable.

Stir the mushrooms gently so that you dont break them up.

Reduce the heat and stir through the thickened (or heavy) cream.  Crack some pepper and add a pinch of salt. Then chop a generous amount of fresh parsley and stir into the mushroom sauce. Your kitchen should smell totally delish right about now!

To plate up, place your linguine on the plate, the chicken on top to the side and then cover the dish with the mushrooms and lucious sauce, make sure you cover the pasta in plenty of sauce. Sprinkle the top of chicken with Parmesan cheese to make it extra special. Serve to your eager beavers!

Hey Pesto! Pasta

Hey Pesto! Pasta

I just love it when the herbs in the garden are bursting with love! I love the smell of the basil and mint when you brush past them or accidentally knock into them! Mmmmmmm, ok I’ll just pick myself back up off the floor!

So I had to make something scrumptious with the basil. First stop Pesto! I have put together a little blurb to show those of you that have never made fresh pesto, and if you haven’t, shame on you! It’s the best thing EVER and super duper easy.

Here is what you need:

Basil

Garlic

Parmesan

Olive Oil
Pinenuts

(ignore the Boccochini in the shot and bread, my bad)

Add to the food processor all ingredients in moderation, I used half the bunch of basil (approx 4 tablespoons), a couple of generous tablespoons of olive oil, 3 cloves of garlic, approx 2-3 tbsp pinenuts and about half a cup of parmesan cheese. Process until granulated paste. Add olive oil if required to make more moist.

Voila – Now you have pesto! You could add some lemon to stop it going brown if you wanted it to last a few days.

Now all I did was use it in a simple vegetarian pasta to use a punnet of gorgeous tomatoes.

Pasta Sauce

2 Tbsp Olive Oil

Pesto – to taste

Lemon

Punnet of Grape Tomatoes – sliced in half

½ cup Parmesan Cheese

250g Baby Boccochini Cheese balls

Heat oil in large frypan, add the tomatoes and fry them lightly. Next add your pesto to taste (I added alot), and season a squeeze of half a lemon’s juice and then season with salt and pepper. Simmer for 5 minutes.  Add your cheeses to the sauce.

Do not leave your sauce to cook longer then 5 additional minutes once cheese is added, as the tomatoes will turn to mush, and though the taste will be the same, its not near as appetising. 

I served 4 people with this dish.  I also used Linguine to serve the dish nicely, the volume of it soaked up the juices nicely.  After you drain your pasta, place it back in the sauce and then serve it onto the plates.  Sprinkle the served pasta with additional Parmesan cheese and cracked pepper.