Monday, May 21, 2007

Chicken Something for the Soul

I'm home from work sick today. Finally. This stuffy, drippy, coughy, sore-throaty, can't talkie, headachey thing has been coming on, slowly, for a while now. But, the "responsible" inside of me makes it hard to take off from work when I know there are things for me to do there.

I woke up to my alarm at 7:30 this morning. I called my boss and fell back to sleep until 2pm. Whew.

I know I'm feeling better, because I just cooked some chicken goodness. I haven't had vegetables in my fridge for a week. Terrible, I know; but, I missed the farmer's market the last two Saturdays due to seminars and I've been avoiding the grocery store because I blew my food budget before the 15th of the month!

Anyway. Home sick. I walked to the produce stand down the street for some basics: spinach, chard, garlic, apples. Last week, I took some meat out of the freezer to defrost and I had a feeling it was getting near the end of its useful life. I'm taking the ground elk to a friend's birthday barbeque tonight. The other package was chicken breasts. Boneless, skinless chicken breasts. In my parents' house, I ate these for dinner more nights than not. Since cooking for myself, and committing to free-range organic, it's a cut of meat I can't really afford. At $6-7 per pound, give me red meat! (That, and there's so much good stuff in the skin and bones of a free range organic... why bother?) But this package was a gift from a friend who'd held it in her freezer for too long. So I took advantage.

Spinach, Chicken, Feta Surprise

Coat your biggest frying pan with a drizzle of olive oil, and bring to heat.
Rinse your chicken breasts. Place in hot pan.
Season liberally with salt and pepper. Flip. Season again.
Allow to cook through. I'd separated the chicken tenders from the undersides of the breasts. These cook quickly! Keep an eye, so as not to dry them out.

Meanwhile, cut up the half onion that's been lying around, and chop a few cloves of garlic.
When the chicken is cooked, set it aside and put the freshly chopped yummies into the pan. Add more oil if necessary.

Remove the roots from a bunch of spinach. Wash well. Tear, if desired.
Chop or crumble some feta--I used about 3/4 of a carton of Trader Joe's "Authentic Greek Feta in brine" (sheep cheese = okay cheese). Chop the chicken breasts into slices or cubes or chunks or whatever.

When the onions and garlic are fragrant, add the spinach, tossing and wilting until it all fits in the pan. Add the feta. Add the chicken.

Crank up the heat. Toss and mix and cook until the spinach is as soft--or not--as you like, and the feta is as melted--or not--as you like.

Take off the heat and eat up.

Or, do what I did, and store it in something in the fridge until you have an appetite again.

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