Italian Herb Chicken with Broccoli

I’ve become a little bit of a fan of the Land O’ Lakes Saute Express seasonings. I’ve made the Italian Herb before, but this time I decided to change things up a little.

So I decided to add some broccoli to the pan and I sauteed it up with the chicken. I’ve been tolerating plain broccoli florets for a while now so I hoped that adding them to the seasoning would give them a little more flavor.

The broccoli certainly did get cooked in well with the chicken. I do think I may have added it too soon though. The broccoli got a little too soft.

I topped it all off with a little pasta and Parmesan cheese. It made for a great meal with some much needed greens. The broccoli was a bit too mushy, but it was a little more flavorful than usual. Perhaps it would be better to say it hid the broccoli flavor better. Either way, it gave me another way to eat broccoli.

 

Spicy Honey-Brushed Chicken Thighs Recipe

My wife has often commented on how we should cook chicken thighs since they are generally much cheaper than chicken breast. I tended to think they probably weren’t very good if they were so cheap – besides, they are kind of small too. Well, she found a recipe that changed my mind about them even though the recipe does include garlic powder.

I’m including the recipe as it was listed. However, we did stray from it a little.

Ingredients:

• 2 teaspoons garlic powder
• 2 teaspoons chili powder
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1 teaspoon paprika
• 1/2 teaspoon ground red pepper
• 8 skinless, boneless chicken thighs
• Cooking spray
• 6 tablespoons honey
• 2 teaspoons cider vinegar

Directions:

1. Preheat broiler.
2. Combine first 6 ingredients in a large bowl.
3. Add chicken to bowl; toss to coat.
4. Place chicken on a broiler pan coated with cooking spray.
5. Broil chicken 5 minutes on each side.
6. Combine honey and vinegar in a small bowl, stirring well.
7. Remove chicken from oven; brush 1/4 cup honey mixture on chicken. Broil 1 minute. Remove chicken from oven and turn over.
8. Brush chicken with remaining honey mixture. Broil 1 additional minute or until chicken is done.

We couldn’t find boneless chicken thighs so we got them with the bone. That was both good and bad. The good thing about the thighs with bone is that they are a bit bigger. I’m not sure if there actually is more meat on them than if we used boneless, but it gives the appearance of more. On the other hand, they seemed to take a lot longer to cook than the recipe calls for. They say 5 minutes  per side, then brush with honey and do one or two more minutes per side. I think we ended up cooking them around 10 minutes per side.

Regardless of how long they may have taken to cook, I must say they were absolutely delicious. I would never have guessed they were made with garlic powder if I hadn’t read the recipe. The honey made them nice and sweet and the red pepper gave them some kick.

With this recipe, my opinion of chicken thighs has been changed forever. It definitely meets with this fussy eater’s approval.

via Spicy Honey-Brushed Chicken Thighs Recipe | MyRecipes.com.

Land O’ Lakes Saute Express – Lemon Pepper Chicken

We finally had a chance to try the Lemon Pepper variety of the Land O’ Lakes Saute Express seasoning. As with the Italian Herb, it is a mix of butter, olive oil, and seasonings. Simply melt it in the pan and saute the chicken until done. It’s a great way to create a tasty meal with little effort. Perhaps I shouldn’t have said tasty though, since it got mixed reviews from my wife and I.

Believe it or not, Linda was the one who didn’t care for it. She thought it was too lemony for her taste. Personally, I thought it had a nice lemon kick to it. I do think that it would be wise to pick the proper side dish to complement the chicken. We had  yellow rice. I’m not sure it really went well with the lemon. The chicken had a pretty strong lemon flavor so I’m not sure what would work best as a side dish. Any ideas?

Land O’ Lakes Saute Express – Italian Herb Chicken

While Linda was out of town, I opted for a lot for easy to prepare meals. I made Kraft Fresh Take chicken, burgers, and (I hate to admit it) even hot dogs and beans. Another easy meal I made was from a simple seasoning and butter combination – Land O’ Lakes Saute Express. It’s a simple premise. You probably already saute with either butter or oil and then add seasonings to it. Why not just do it all at once? That’s just what Land O’ Lakes has done.

We picked up two varieties a while back – the Italian Herb and the Lemon Pepper. I haven’t had a chance to make the Lemon Pepper yet, so expect to see an entry about it at some point in the near future.

These couldn’t be much easier to use. Simply melt a pack in the pan and add the chicken to it. I prefer to cut up the chicken into nice bite sized pieces, but you could leave it whole if you prefer. Then just saute until the chicken gets golden brown.

I found this to be a pretty quick and easy way to saute up some chicken. However, the real test in in the taste. It doesn’t matter how quick and easy it is if it doesn’t pass the taste test. I’m glad to say that it does meet with this fussy eater’s approval. I look forward to trying the Lemon Pepper variety.