Herbed Chicken with Basil Pasta and Bacon Brussels Sprouts

Yesterday, when I got to Mikey’s house after class we didn’t have much to do so we decided to get off our lazy butts and actually start the blog we’ve been talking about for a few weeks now.  It was a rainy Wednesday afternoon in Cleveland and it was actually snowing out in Kent where I go to school.  Perfect day for staying in and cooking.  We headed to the West Side Market without a recipe in mind.  We decided to peruse the stands and let all the amazing food selections at the market peak our inspiration. 

After looking at everything and saying hi to the people who work at our favorite stands we finally decided to make a pasta dish.  The other night Mikey had eaten some sort of green ravioli stuffed with artichokes and cheese at the Winking Lizard so he was in the mood for more green pasta.  The best stand at the market for pasta is Ohio City Pasta.  The pasta is fresh, homemade and relatively inexpensive.  It costs just as much as the dried stuff you can buy at the grocery store only it is twice as good.  We grabbed a couple bundles of basil pasta and some red wine and shalot butter Ohio City Pasta was selling.  Mikey decided we should use chicken as our protein so we purchased a couple of boneless skinless chicken breasts.  To go along with the pasta we grabbed a homemade, organic French baguette, a small chunk of fresh parmesan, some brussels sprouts, and we had a little change leftover so we replenished our garlic supply.

The Recipe:

Ingredients for the chicken:

• 2 boneless skinless chicken breasts
• fresh ground black pepper to taste
• 2 tsps Jamaican Jerk seasoning (You can use whatever seasoning you like.  I used Jamaican Jerk because that was the only jar of seasoning Mikey had in the cupboard.  Personally, I was hoping for some rosemary and thyme.)
• 2 tsps garlic salt
• 1 tbsp butter

Directions: Set the oven to 350.  Clean your chicken making sure to trim off fat and anything else you wouldn’t want to eat.  Season the chicken with the pepper, Jamaican Jerk (or whatever herbs you choose), and garlic salt.  Grease a casserole dish with some nonstick cooking spray and place the chicken breasts therein.  Then divide the butter and top each chicken breast with a dollop.  While cooking the butter melts over the chicken and makes it really moist and delicious.  Pop the chicken in the oven for about 20 minutes.  Check on it every so often with a meat thermometer until it comes up to temperature. 

While the chicken was cooking I started the brussels sprouts and the baguette.

Ingredients for the brussels sprouts:

• 1 lb brussels sprouts
• 3 strips of bacon cut into 1 inch pieces
• 1 leek sliced (We these lying around the house so we decided to use them before they went bad.)
• 3 cloves of garlic
• salt and pepper taste

Directions:  First you have to prepare the brussels sprouts for cooking.  To get your sprouts evenly cooked you have to score the bottom.  Just take a sharp knife and make a little X on the bottom of each sprout.  Mikey and I used a rice cooker to steam our sprouts but you can do it over the stove with a steamer basket in a saucepan of water.  Make sure to cover it.  It takes about 10-15 minutes for sprouts to steam up so they are soft enough to eat.  You can poke at them every so often with a fork to make sure they don’t get overdone. While the sprouts are steaming get to cooking your bacon. 

Now, a lot of people don’t like brussels sprouts or at least they don’t think they do, but I guarantee you if you cook sprouts with bacon you could get anyone to eat them.  Like Ghandi used to say, “Everything is better with bacon”. (Bad joke.  I don’t think he actually ever said that.)  Anyways, start sizzling some bacon in a saute pan until it is nice and crisp.  Do not and I repeat, do not drain the fat.  Once the bacon is crisp add your garlic and leeks then add the sprouts.  The sprouts are already cooked so you’re really just looking to coat them with the bacony goodness.

While I was cooking the bacon I did some multi-tasking and whipped up a homemade garlic butter to put on the baguette to make our own garlic bread.  The recipe for this is as follows:

Ingredients:

• half a cup of butter at room temperature
• 2 tbsp garlic paste
• 3 garlic cloves, minced
• grated parmesan
• salt and pepper to taste

Directions:  This is really simple and really really delicious.  All you have to do is mix together the butter, garlic cloves and garlic paste until everything is well incorporated.  Liberally spread the mixture onto slices of French baguette and top with salt, pepper, and grated parmesan.  You can stick these in the oven once the chicken is done and while you’re waiting for the pasta to cook.

By this time the chicken should be done, the sprouts are done, you’re well on your way to making some delicious homemade garlic bread.  The only thing that is left is the pasta.  I did this last because Ohio City Pasta only takes a couple of minutes to cook because it is so fresh.  At the stand, they usually include cooking directions for the pasta so just follow those.  Once the pasta was nice and al dente I returned it to the pan and melted the red wine and roasted shallot butter over it.

To plate this meal, get a nice nest of pasta on the plate, slice your chicken and place on top of the pasta and then grate some more parmesan on top.  Serve with the sprouts and bread on the side.

 

My thoughts: For our first Cooking with Jackson recipe this was a really good one.  It was filling and delicious with just the right amount of garlic and all the layers of flavor complimented each other, even the Jamaican Jerk seasoning which I was skeptical about.  The whole meal sounds really complicated but it really only took me about 45 minutes to whip this up.  Seriously, try it.  You’ll thank me later.

Mikey’s thoughts:  Alright so I was totally wanting some green pasta like anyone else who appreciates good green pasta. Let me tell you that the basil pasta from Ohio City Pasta was amazing.  For all you Greater Clevelanders out there that love good pasta, go to Ohio City Pasta at the Westside Market.  Believe me it is the very best when it comes to flavored pasta that only takes a minute or two to cook.  The pasta with the buttery sauce was the perfect match and the chicken on top was also equally amazing.  The sides are what I had the biggest time generating a taste for.  Michelle suggested that we have brussels sprouts that had been cooked in bacon grease.  I originally didn’t know what to think of this new way of eating brussels sprouts but let me tell you that it was awesome.  The bacon really helped the boring taste of the sprout to become something meaty and awesome.  From this day forth brussels sprouts shall be cooked in bacon fat.  No joke… it was that awesome.  The garlic bread however I do have some comments on.  I feel there was a little too much salt involved.  Perhaps for future cooking the salt shall be added to the butter beforehand or sprinkled in slightly lesser amounts than what we put on.  Not that I dont like salt or anything, cause I love it, but the salty-ness was a little overpowering.  All in all I would have to say that this is definitely a meal that I would cook for my mother.  She would love it.  Mom, if you are reading this… you have some good cooking coming your way.

In complete retrospect, for $20 bucks, the dinner we created was totally worth the very minimal effort that was putforth to create it.  A little baking, boiling, chopping and seasoning and it was a smash hit.

 

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