Chicken, Broccoli & Noodles, oh my!

So another food adventure here! Don’t know why that is the theme currently (ya know… twice in a row and all) but it is…

                    

So the other night I was inspired to make something pretty basic. Meat, noodles and veggies. I was inspired by some leftovers I had at a friends house. I did kind of make a twist on it though. (as I like to do… running with someone else’s idea and tweaking it to my own taste pallet, and more importantly, to be Healthier as well.)  And here were the results of my food experiment:

Honestly I have no technical recipe details. Because I very much played it by ear.

I decided to fry up some chicken in my frying pan using only olive oil and coconut oil. Just a little bit. (maybe a tablespoon? For both combined as a total I mean. Not 2 table spoons, but 1) I chopped up the raw chicken tenders beforehand (maybe 3 chicken tenders?) into little cubes and put them into the already hot pan. I put just a dash of sea salt on them and let them cook away. Moving them around on occasion with a wooden spoon to help make the cooking more even.

 Meanwhile I had a pot full of water boiling, waiting for my gluten free – Trader Joe’s Corn Penne Pasta to come on in.  This time I used the Corn penne pasta because I felt it would compliment the flavor better since I wasn’t making any kind of thick sauce, just olive oil. I’m not a big fan of brown rice noodles alone, but corn noodles on their own have a nice little flavor to them. And to be honest, I’m pretty tired of spaghetti shaped noodles.

So then I (I like to time my boiling since I use an electric stove. I put the water on, put the knob to medium and then put my timer on for 12 minutes. By then, it is boiling.) grab a small handful of frozen broccoli (1/2 cup?) and put it in the boiling water for like 3 minutes. Long enough to defrost and refresh them. Then I scoop them out with a slotted spoon and proceed to chop them up into little mini broccoli and put them into the frying pan.

I then put my Corn Penne Pasta into the boiling hot water and cook those for 9 mins

So Chicken is cooked about 20mins, Broccoli about 10 mins, and Pasta about 9. if you do it right it should all take only 20 mins though.

And then I thought something crazy.

Earlier that day when I did my grocery shopping I grabbed some strawberries. Mostly because they smelled amazing upon my walking in the door and so, by influence of my nose, knew I needed them. While I was frying everything up, I chose to cut up a few strawberries and add them to the mix adding color and a sweetness to my dinner.

When all was strained and done, I just put everything together in a bowl. I didn’t add more olive oil or anything, just put everything in my bowl to eat up, and you know what? It wasn’t bad at all!

Upon further reflection I would do 1 thing different. They crazy ingredient

–        the strawberries   --

 needed to be dealt with differently.

Either I don’t add them at all to the heat (because of their fragile nature) or I only do for about 15 seconds or so. Not a couple of minutes. But hey, I wanted to see what would happen! Plus I would make sure they were sweeter. These were just a bit too tart.

Anyway, that was my cooking adventure, but I foresee more coming upon me this weekend with memorial day on the rise. I do like to make a “weekend meal” when I can, which means one big meal I really like and I can just eat off of all weekend instead of cooking over and over again. (which I find tiring…)

The adventures I am planning?

Gluten Free Dark Chocolate chip & Oatmeal cookies……

Home made healthier Worcestershire sauce (mostly for the next item)

Gluten free (and healthier) Chex Mix

AND

Beef Tea….

I’m sure you’re like “what the crap is “Beef Tea?” and trust me, what you find on the internet is NOT what I want to make. The one on the internet is this sad beefy soup brothy thing (which with the name of it, makes sense really) and tends to be served to elderly people as a source of protein… Like old school Ensure….

But what I want to make was/ is a family recipe. Which tragically I did not get from my mother before her passing. A true failure on my part. And so I will try to re-create it this weekend….

With any luck…

 but more on that for the next post….

PS- I have every intention of watching the new season of arrested development this weekend as well…. Oh yeah…. Mr. Manager is in charge here. Right now I’m gearing up by re-watching all 3 previous seasons that thankfully exist on Netflix instant play….

As a nice      little      warm-up…..