Chicken in Creamy Chive Sauce and Some More Pork

Oy. Once again, time has gotten away from me and I find myself sharing something I cooked a week and a half ago. It was so delicious, though, that I can’t just relegate it to the files of the never posted. And look, Ma, a balanced dinner! I made this for Mr. X and was all worried that it wasn’t going to be that good: I got the recipe from Eating Well, and have found it to be a little hit or miss (my Mediterranean Pasta Bake was kind of bland, even after I added seasoning to the original recipe). This recipe, for Sauteed Chicken Breasts with Creamy Chive Sauce, was a winner.

The chicken stayed really nice and juicy, and the sauce was just mustardy enough to add a bit of kick, but not so much it grossed me out, seeing as I don’t totally love mustard. The only change I made to Eating Well’s recipe was leaving out the shallots: I didn’t have them. I used about two cloves of garlic instead.

I decided to make roasted potatoes and broccoli to really play up that whole housewifely balanced meal kinda thing. Roasting broccoli is one of my favorite broccoli preparations around. Roasting adds this awesome kind of nutty flavor, and the little green florets get all crispy and delicious. The potatoes probably could have done with a quick boil, or at the very least a steam in the microwave, because they didn’t quite cook all the way through. That is a problem I seem to have relatively often. Iundercook. Here are some instructions that result in properly cooked vegetables:

Roasted Potatoes and Broccoli

• four or five potatoes (I used small white potatoes)
• a head of broccoli
• 1-2 T. olive oil
• salt and pepper
• perhaps some rosemary or parsley or tarragon, if you’re feeling adventurous

Heat the oven to 375F. Cut the potatoes into bite-sized pieces, about an inch square. Chop up the broccoli into smaller florets. Toss everything with the olive oil, salt and pepper, and any herbs you want to add. Then separate the potatoes and the broccoli. Put the potatoes in a roasting pan, and stick them in the oven for about 20 to 30 minutes, or until the potatoes are starting to soften and maybe turn a little brown. Then stir the potatoes around a bit and add the broccoli. Cook for another 20 minutes. Voila, roasted vegetables, which are lovely for scraping up the chive sauce from the chicken.

Also last week? Another week o’ pork. Pork tenderloin was on sale at the Roche, and I had to get some. I spent a few days agonizing (alright, it wasn’t really agony) over how I was going to prepare it, and I finally just made something up. And it was spectacular.

Herbed Breaded Pork Tenderloin and Shalloty Green Beans

• 1 – 2 lb. pork tenderloin
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 c. bread crumbs
• 1/4 c. finely chopped parsley
• 1/4 c. finely chopped marjoram
• salt and pepper
• 1 T. olive oil

This was pretty darn simple. Preheat the oven to 375F. Whisk the eggs in a medium sized bowl, and blend the bread crumbs, chopped herbs, and salt and pepper together in another bowl. Dip the pork tenderloin in the egg to coat it thoroughly, then dip it into the bread crumb mix so the whole tenderloin is well coated. Heat the oil in a large skillet, and cook the tenderloin for about 3 or 4 minutes on each side, or until its nice and browned. You can then put the whole skillet in the oven, or transfer the tenderloin to a preheated baking dish and use the porky skillet to make the green beans (yum, porky green beans).

Shallots and Green Beans

I thought these would be kind of boring, but they were surprisingly awesome. I think it’s because I cooked them in the tasty pork juices.

• about 3 c. green beans, cut into pieces as big or small as you like
• 2 shallots, sliced
• 2 cloves of garlic, minced
• olive oil

First, you want to blanch the green beans for a minute or two, so they actually get soft and cooked. Heat a large pot of salted water to boil, and toss those green beans in for a bit. Then fish them out using a spider, or drain the pot.

Heat a bit of olive oil over medium heat, preferably in a pan you just used to cook some delicious meat. Then add the shallots. Cook them for a few minutes, until they just start to soften and turn kind of transparent around the edges. Then add the garlic and the green beans, and mix everything really, really well, so the green beans get coated in the olive oil and the shallots are well mixed in. Then, just put a lid on the pan, and let them all cook up for about 6 or 7 minutes, checking it out and stirring every now and then. I like to let the green beans and shallots get just a little browned.

Yay for delicious pork and meaty green beans. And yay for me actually finding twenty minutes to sit down and type this up. I know the writing here is suffering a little bit. I feel so darned rushed every time I can squeeze some bloggity blogging in, it suckity sucks.

Some other things that will be coming up: I made the most random cauliflower and ground beef gratin that actually turned out to be spectacular. I’m planning to make biscotti this weekend. And I think it’s getting to be chili time. Yeahhh.