Wednesday Night

We had no food in the house and I really needed to cook tonight. Problem was, I had no idea what to make. I knew we had 4 boxes of orzo (pasta that looks like rice), some frozen chicken breasts and a bag of frozen acre peas I'd brought back from Georgia at Christmas (they've never heard of acre peas in Texas).

Well, Hannah and I were in Wal-Mart getting bunny supplies when I thought about dinner, so I grabbed a bunch of veggies to broil and toss w/ orzo and figured I'd improvise with the chicken.

Clark Lee to the rescue! He was on Gmail when I was at home, so I IM'd him for advice. He suggested a rub of spices on the chicken and then a reduction using red wine vinegar once the chicken was cooked. Clark! It was fanTAStic. Lanier liked it a lot.

We all ate quickly, barely dignifying my extraordinary meal with the admiration it deserved, ran Hannah to youth group and then hit the Y to work out.

Broiled Vegetables with Orzo

1 orange bell pepper

1 green bell pepper

1 red onion

1 large tomato

2 anaheim peppers (banana peppers)

1 squash

italian seasoning

I sprayed the pans with oil, chopped up the veggies in big bite-sized pieces, lay them on the pans and sprayed with oil. I sprinkled Italian seasoning and broiled the pans separately at 500 degrees for about 10-12 minutes total. I boiled the orzo in salted water, drained, and dumped in a bowl and doused it with grape seed oil. Add the veggies, stir. YUM!

Chicken Breasts with Red Wine Vinegar Reduction

3 chicken breasts

fresh ground black pepper

sea salt

oregano (dried)

parsley (dried)

celery seed

chopped onions (dried)

garlic powder

I sprinkled all that stuff on the chicken breasts (using parsely b/c I ran out of oregano). I added some grape seed oil to a pan, sauteed the chicken on each side about 2 minutes, then turned down the heat to low, covered and simmered not quite 20 minutes total (10 min on each side).

Remove the chicken from the pan, scrape up the juicy bits, add red wine vinegar (I dunno, a fourth of a cup?) and turn heat to medium to cook off some of the vinegar. We let it go a couple of minutes and then spooned it over the chicken n stuff. OMG it was so good!! Thanks, Clark.