Bacon Wrapped Chicken

Day 19-Did my kitchen depression carry on? Yes and no. I did want to get into the kitchen and cook last night, but only because I wanted to get it over with. The passion is gone people, at least for this week. Being the amazing person I am, I carried on with cooking as planned. No take out tonight! I had a feeling this meal was actually going to taste pretty good so that was the goal that I kept looking towards in order to get through the process.

I wanted to make something with bacon in it this week to honor Anthony, my bacon fanatic husband. I came across a recipe for Bacon Wrapped Chicken on Taste of Home. This is a pretty fattening recipe so if you are looking for something dainty and healthy check out my other posts. Last night I still really didn’t have a side dish in mind for this chicken. I bought some zucchini at the store on Sunday, so I needed to do something with that. I looked through the cupboards and found a partially used box of plain couscous. Perfect! Since I was flying by the seat of my pants with this one, I asked Anthony what I should add to zucchini sautéed in olive oil. He said it would probably only need some onion sautéed with it. Onion! My mortal enemy. Why do we always need to use it?! But alas I decided that would be the best option.

Did I mention this recipe is quick? It’s great for a weeknight dinner. So I started getting the chicken ready. I pounded the chicken out until it was pretty thin. Then I took the chive and onion cream cheese and spread it onto each chicken breast. I think I went a little overboard and could probably use a little less cream cheese next time. Then for whatever reason the recipe says to put a few dabs of butter on top of the cream cheese, so I did. Anyone know what that would be for?? I’m not sure it’s necessary, since I can’t figure out what the butter’s purpose is. Don’t forget some salt after you add the butter. Once that is finished, you roll the chicken breasts and wrap one piece of bacon around each one. Place the chicken breasts seam-side down on a greased baking pan. Pop them in the oven at 400 degrees for 35 minutes.

After the chicken was in the oven I chopped up the zucchini and onion. Once the chicken had been cooking for a bit I started sautéing the zucchini and onion in olive oil. But as is typical with my brain it must have shut down and I put the zucchini and onions in the pan at the same time. Oops! Not a huge ordeal, the onion just didn’t cook the way I really wanted it to. I added some salt and pepper to the vegetables. Once the veggies were nicely sautéed I started the couscous. I love couscous, it cooks so fast! Yay!

Now the chicken is ready to be put under the broiler for 5 minutes. I had to go to the bathroom at this point in the process, so I left the kitchen for a few seconds. Next thing I know the smoke detector is going off. I tell Anthony to deal with it since I was in the bathroom. He comes into the kitchen and checks the chicken and says he saw a fire in the oven. So he shut the oven off and apparently everything was all better. I did notice that there was bacon grease splattered on the oven door, but I never saw a fire just a little smoke inside the oven. If only one person see's the fire, then the fire doesn't exist. Right?

The couscous was mixed into the zucchini and onion mixture, with a tablespoon of olive oil. Looking good, if I do say so myself. The chicken smelled and looked pretty good too. I’m not a good chicken cooker. Chicken makes me nervous, since I’ve gotten food poisoning twice from chicken. Never any cooked at home though, so that makes me feel a bit better about the situation. Plus this chicken was on “fire” so it must be done!

Final Product:

All of this tasted good to me! No complaints. I think I could have done without the extra grease sitting under the chicken. A broiler pan might be the better pan to use next time. When eating the chicken with each bite you get some of the cream cheese goodness and the bacon flavor. Anthony added some parmesan cheese to the top of the couscous and it was the perfect addition. Yum! As far as I know Anthony also liked this meal, but since I’m not sure if he is telling me the truth I’m suspicious!

Totals: 10 minutes prep, 40 minutes cooking time, 1 baking pan.

Next up: Grilled Salmon Bacon and Feta Packets with Kale Chips

Curry Pork Sausage Couscous

Day 16-Okay I will admit that this is a cheat day. We are leaving for vacation on Wednesday and I didn’t want to go shopping or make too much of a mess. So I elected to cook a recipe that I’ve cooked for dinner before. I have never used it for the blog though. That’s why I think it’s okay.

Reality tv update-Spoiler Alert: Top Chef Restaurant Wars was disappointing for me. I was really pulling for the blue team (Kenny, Kevin, Kelly, Amanda) and they lost. Not only did they lose, but Kenny was told to pack his knives and leave. I thought he was going to be there well until the end. I’m still rooting for Kevin or maybe one of the girls. I hope Angelo doesn’t win. He has just bothered me from the start. And what the heck is up with Alex, he needs to go pronto. The Next Food Network Star winner is Aarti. I can’t say I’m shocked. I liked Aarti from the beginning. Partly because she cooks Indian food and as we all know that’s one of my favorite things. I was actually sad that Tom didn’t win, because I really did like his pilot. His was the most entertaining, but I guess Food Network is Aarti’s destiny (I think she mentioned something like that last night).

Last night’s meal was Curry Pork Sausage Couscous, yup more curry! Love it! Last week I read a blog and they posted the health benefits of Turmeric, so I say eat as much as you can! It’s super for you! I always tweak this recipe a little. I used a box of Near East Mediterranean Curry Couscous instead of regular couscous. I love a lot of flavor! Instead of pork sausage I used some poultry sausage I had in the freezer. It really doesn’t matter what sausage or couscous your use, but if you want more flavor use the Mediterranean kind. I put the water on to boil for the couscous with some olive oil and the spice packet, then once the water boiled I stirred in the couscous. Then I covered it and took it off the heat.

Once the couscous is sitting, (although to be honest I started this part while the water was boiling) you put the rest of the ingredients (except parsley) in a skillet and cook them up. So that’s the sausage (I de-cased it and chopped it into pieces), onion, garlic, pistachios, curry powder (I added more then the recipe calls for), and salt. You cook all of that together until the sausage is no longer pink. Then you can either put the couscous in the skillet or dump the sausage mixture into the pan that you cooked the couscous in (that’s what I do). Put that over a medium heat until warm. Viola you are finished! Easy! It was also a good thing that Anthony actually wanted this for dinner, and was pleasantly surprised that I had made it.

By the way, I did try chopping the onion like I had learned and it once again didn’t work out. I’m not sure what I’m doing wrong. How hard can this be?!

Final Product:

My thoughts, it’s easy and yummy. Plus you get the health benefits of the curry, so eat up!

Totals: 5 minutes prep, 15 minutes cooking time, 1 pot, 1 skillet

Well folks it’s been real, but I am officially on vacation from my blog after this post. I will just be cooking hot dogs and beans tonight and a friend of ours is cooking for us Tuesday. Needless to say I will not be cooking Wednesday-Sunday and will back with a new post on Monday. Ciao!