Dinner 7/22

I tried two new recipes for dinner tonight and they both turned out great! ...if you forgive the fact that we had to make an emergency run to the grocery store halfway through prep.

Now, now: I made sure I had everything, and I did; it's certainly not my fault that the chicken went off before it's "best by" date!

After exchanging the chicken, however, things went (mostly) smoothly.

The dishes served up are Italian chicken, herbed potatoes, and salad. (I'm altering the way they appear here from the original recipes, according to how I cooked them.)

Italian Chicken:

(Altered from Taste of Home's Quick Cooking Jan/Feb 2004 issue on pg 48)


3 boneless chicken breasts (recipe calls for 4 pcs)
1 cup Italian salad dressing
2 tablespoons Parmesan cheese

Spray the bottom & sides of a small baking dish with nonstick spray. (A 9" square pan would work great.) Place chicken in dish. Pour Italian dressing over the chicken. Sprinkle Parmesan over the chicken. Bake, uncovered, at 375 for 45 minutes or until chicken juices run clear. 

Herbed Potatoes:
(Altered from Taste of Home's Quick Cooking March/April 2004 issue on pg 40)


2 cans (15 ounces each) sliced potatoes
3 tablespoons of margarine, melted
2 teaspoons + 1 dash parsley, divided
1/4 teaspoon dried rosemary, crushed
1/8 teaspoon black pepper
Dash of garlic salt

Drain and rinse potatoes. Place in a bowl, and drizzle melted margarine over them. Add other ingredients; gently mix with a wooden spoon to combine. Add to a square 9-inch baking pan. Sprinkle just a bit more parsley over the potatoes in the pan. Bake, uncovered, at 375 for 18 minutes, or until potatoes on top start to brown.

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We also had an endive, spinach, arugula, baby lettuce, carrot, radish, cucumber, and tomato salad. Everything but the cukes and tomatoes came bagged. Dad and I had 1000 Island dressing, even though Dorothy Lynch is another favorite of ours, and mom used Italian dressing, since it's one of her favorites.

The original recipe of the chicken breasts calls for using four breasts (for four servings) but my family only has three people in it, so what's the point of cooking an extra piece of chicken? It also says to cook it for 20-25 minutes, but we cooked our three pieces for 25 minutes and they were so not done. We stuck them back in for another 20 and they were perfectly done.
The original recipe for the potatoes uses canned whole potatoes, which we didn't have, and doesn't say anything about draining & rinsing. (I always drain & rinse my canned veggies  because it's so much healthier to do so!) It also only calls for one can, but that would not have been enough. Even though there were more potatoes, I knew that increasing the cooking time was not important, especially since the temperature was increased (slightly) from the original recipe, and because the potatoes were sliced. (Kinda like how slicing potatoes before you cook them for mashing makes them cook faster.) That was one thing I really liked about this recipe: both dishes can be cooked in the same oven.
Since I was following the original chicken recipe, I cooked the chicken for 10 minutes, put the potatoes in, and cooked everything for an additional 15 minutes. I left the potatoes in the oven while I checked the chicken, which was not done, and then took them out when it was decided that we would eat what was ready first (the salad & potatoes) and then eat the chicken when it was done.
I think, though, if one uses thinly sliced chicken breasts (or 2 pieces of chicken tenderloin per person, so 8 tenderloins for a family of 4) the 25 minute time might be sufficient. Our chicken breasts were not extraordinarily thick, by any means, they were just not done by the time the recipe said to be done.

This is one reason why I love cooking: experimentation.
I'm not saying that the original recipes won't work if followed to the letter, I'm just blogging about the way I made the food presented in the recipes and showing my ways around it.

If anyone reads this and would like the original recipes, please let me know and I'd be happy to email them to you.
Also if you try any of these recipes, please let me know what you think. I know my family loved them! These are definitely keepers in my (recipe) book.