Easy Chicken Bacon Pasta

This Chicken Bacon Pasta is so easy - and so delicious - you can pick up a couple ingredients on the way home from work and have it ready within a half hour! Or so, depends on your motivation level - ours took closer to an hour because we took our sweet time before enjoying this smokey, cheesy, yummy dinner. 

What makes this Chicken Bacon Pasta easy? Store-bought rotissery chicken! Most grocery stores have these easy-to-grab, cooked-and-warm chickens in little bags ready to go. I usually glance at thedate and time stamp on the label, this one I picked up from Whole Foods for $7.99 had just been put out less than an hour before. And they certainly have the rotissery process down pat, these things are so convenient when you don't have time to roast a chicken yourself.

 Along with a rotissery chicken, we picked up:

• 1 pack bacon
• 1 white onion
• Garlic
• Parmigiano Reggiano

Along with stuff we already had at home:

• half-n-half
• white wine (optional)
• salt, crushed red pepper
• thin spaghetti
• olive oil

Super easy, we quickly preheated a stainless steel sacier pan over medium heat and - using kitchen scissors - cut 7 pieces of bacon into the hot pan. As those cooked off (with a helper stirring occasionally) we prepped the other ingredients. We quartered and then diced the onion by whirring it in our little veggie chopper. 

Along with the onion we grated about 1 cup of the parmigian and squeezed 2 garlic cloves through the garlic press. We "shredded" half of the chicken which is really easy with a store bought rotissery chicken - you can really just pull it apart and then use a knife to cut it into bite-size pieces. We used one thigh/drum and half of the breast. The other half of the chicken will be chicken salad tomorrow! We also added a second pot half full of water to the stove and got that up to boiling temperate for the spaghetti.

When the bacon was done we removed it carefully from the grease to a paper towel-lined plate and used another paper towel and tongs to remove the grease from the page, leaving some bacon "residue" behind. Then, we added 1 tbsp of olive oil and started sauteeing the onions over the same medium heat. We added a pinch of salt and a few shakes of crushed red pepper.

After about 5 minutes, we started boiling the pasta (we used about a 1-inch handful) which will go for about 7 minutes, starting our final countdown. Another minute and the onions are soft and translucent so we added the crushed garlic and stirred that in for a minute. Then, we added 1/2 cup of white wine (optional see below) to the pan and turned the heat up to medium high and really scraped the bacon residue and onions and garlic into that deglazing liquid - for about 2 minutes. When that liquid nearly evaporated, we took a measuring cup and carefully took some of the pasta water and added that to the onion mixture to keep the moisture going. You don't have to use white wine, alternatively you can just use the pasta water for this whole process!

THEN! We added the chopped chicken and bacon and stirred that in and THEN we took some tongs and tranferred the pasta directly to the sauce, using the tongs to stir it all together. Finally, we added 1/2 of the cheese (1/2 cup) reserving the other 1/2 to put over the top. Final stir and you are done!

We added some cheese over that and we were done! Super yummy Chicken Bacon Pasta with some for leftovers - all that left to do are the dishes!

We'll take a moment here to say this is our first post in OVER 14 YEARS. We started this blog 20 YEARS AGO and our heyday was definitely 2006-2008 - before a set of twins showed up and threw our schedule all out of whack. Those twins are now 17 years old and going to be seniors in high school looking at college! Who knows, if they depart perhaps we'll have the time back that we had 20 years ago to start documenting our cooking again! Thanks for visiting.

Sausage Stuffed Acorn Squash

I have to make this dish at least once a year, not only because it's yummy, but the presentation is really cool. Acorn squash are very easy to find even in your local market. They are a "winter squash" that has an orange flesh, and is aptly named since they do resemble acorns. You can simply cut them in half, scoop out the seeds, sprinkle with brown sugar and some butter and then bake them!



I had made marinara sauce a day before since I had the time to simmer it for a long time -- I froze half and set aside the rest in the fridge for the squash the next night. The first thing to do is pre-heat your oven to 375. Wash the squash (2 of them), and then cut it in half lengthwise (not around the equator) and scoop out the seeds. Place the squash in a 9 x 13 glass baking dish flesh side up. Put a little bit of water in the dish and cover with foil. Bake for 40-55 minutes or until the squash is just fork tender (not mushy!)



While the squash was baking, I sauteed up some spicy turkey sausage (a little over a pound), and then added my sauce to the pan to reheat. While that was simmering away, I cooked up some whole wheat rigatoni just al dente. When the squash were done, I removed them from the dish, dumped out the water and then returned them to the dish. In went some rigatoni (extra pasta went around the squash). Then came the sausage/sauce mixture, and to top it all off, some mozzarella cheese. Back into the oven at 400 for 20 minutes or until the cheese is starting to brown on top.



The spicy sausage pairs well with the sweetness of the acorn squash -- another fall delight! Oh, and this would serve 4 if served with a side salad!

Grilled Salmon with Spinach Alfredo Pasta

What do you get when you mix 2 cups of cooked spinach with 1 cup of alfredo, lots of garlic and a handful of whole wheat pasta? A super bed of yummy goodness on which to rest a nice piece of grilled salmon of course!

We simply marinated a couple of salmon filets in white wine, chopped chives, and some salt for about 30 minutes, and then grilled them to perfection on a hot grill for 4 minutes on each side. To plate, make a thick pool of your creamed spinach mixture, top with a bit of whole wheat angel hair pasta, and set the cooked salmon on top. Super easy dish to make (especially for a crowd!!)

We’re off to go fishing again this weekend, but this time up in New Hampshire. Hopefully we’ll catch something to put on our table!

Spinach Meatballs

In the past, we've made meatballs by frying them in a pan which was messy and somewhat tedious - since we need to be making some sort of marinara at the same time. I then remembered seeing an episode of Good Eats where Alton Brown bakes the balls of meat instead of frying them. Why hadn't we tried this before? And you can make more meatballs at the same time as well, and more is always better!

We mixed a little over a pound of ground turkey with 1.5 cups of thawed and well drained spinach. I added about 1/4 c. parmesan, 1/2 tbsp Worchestershire, some dried oregano, basil, S&P and some Penzey's Cajun Seasoning. I mixed that together and added roughly 1/3 c of breadcrumbs until the mixture was no longer gooey. I did not add an egg to this, but in retrospect, that would've bound everything together a bit better.



After forming 1.5inch balls, I placed them on a greased pan and stuck them at 400F for 20 minutes, turned them and cooked for 5 minutes more. After plunking them into the marinara for a few minutes more, we served them up over some whole wheat angel hair pasta.

And what to do with leftovers...meatball sandwiches of course!

Italian Wedding Soup II

We finished off our Sunday by making Italian Wedding Soup. We've made Italian Wedding Soup before and we did it up very similarily this time - turkey meatballs, lots of onions and celery and parsley, carrots, spinach, and some good broth are all you really need.


Veggies, Ready To Go


Making Meatballs

Brown the meatballs first, add the veggies (hold the spinach) to the chicken broth/stock, then add the meatballs. When you're near-ready to eat, add your spinach and pasta and cook until the pasta is done. We crushed up some penne with a hammer in a paper bag to have some smaller pasta bits more suited to Italian Wedding Soup!


Simmering Away


The Final Product

A delicious end to a great Sunday - the Patriots won in a very tight and exciting game - so they are on to Indy to play in the AFC Championship on this upcoming Sunday... Sounds like we have another Sunday of food-and-football coming up!

What We've Eaten II

We've been out of town, but we've still been cooking and eating! We had a great Christmas visit to the homeland - Northern Maine - where we cooked a 10-lb turkey on Christmas Day. Along with that, we had mashed potatoes, boiled turnips, stuffing, green beans, cranberry sauce... the works.



We brought home at least four pounds of that turkey so we are still reaping the benefits - we made a "Turkey Surprise Soup" last night which consisted of anything we had in the cupboard along with shredded turkey. Sauteed onion, carrot, and garlic; deglazed with a little red wine and vinegar; added chicken stock and some leftover herbs (oregano and thyme) and seasonings (see below!); added one can of kidney beans, one can of yellow wax beans, one can of tomato sauce, one can of button mushrooms, some frozen green-and-red pepper strips, and the shredded turkey. Cooked that for about 1/2 hour and ate it hungrily - it even seemed to help clear up some lingering colds that we're trying to shake!

Seasonings... One of the BEST Christmas presents we received was a collection of spices from Penzey's! French sea salt, tellicherry peppercorns, mexican oregano, cumin, smoked paprika. Also, some blends - Lemon Pepper Seasoning, Fox Point seasoning (very chive-and-shalloty - had some with scrambled eggs this morning, really good!) and Old World Seasoning which is a blend of just about everything... Plenty of the Old World Seasoning went in our "Turkey Surprise Soup" and really made it savory and delicious...

Before we left for Maine we cooked a quarter-ham, knowing that we were doing turkey instead of our traditional ham for Christmas in Maine this year. Glazed, smokey, and tender, it was delicious with some mashed sweet potatoes: Just peel and cut two sweet potatoes into 2-inch chunks and throw them into some salted boiling water for 10-14 minutes (Although Alton Brown says you should steam sweet potatoes instead of boiling prior to mashing). Drain them and return to the hot pan to burn off some of the residual water. Season with salt, pepper and whatever else tickles your fancy... sautéed garlic or a bit of Penzey’s Cajun Seasoning. Add a few pats of butter - or margarine/promise/whatever - and a couple tbsp of milk, half-n-half or cream depending on your dietary needs. We used promise and 2% milk and a splash of half-n-half.

We sliced the ham and enjoyed it with the mashed sweet po's with some green beans - along with a big dollop of dijon mustard.



We also had our famous Pasta Puttanesca earlier last week - but with twist.. we added fresh baby spinach to our normal recipe. Added some green and a little crunch, it was pretty good!



We'll be back with one more post to wrap up the year - our 5 favorite Boston Chef blog posts from the first year (over 50 to choose from!) - tell us your faves in comments if you like. Thanks for coming... and Merry Christmas!

Italian Wedding Soup (or whatever-I-have-in-my-pantry soup)

It's been pretty wet, cold and rainy here in Boston for a little while and with Labor Day upon us, it certainly feels like the end of summer. Although I am sure we'll be getting a few more 80 degree days, probably when I'm stuck at work all day. Figures. Oh and be prepared, my father consulted nature and the almanac and he insists it will be a very cold winter. With that in mind we've had comfort food on the brain. And what's better than a good soup or stew?

Mixed some ground turkey with sage, thyme, salt, pepper, grated parmesan, a little bit of breadcrumbs and some worchestshire. Form into 1 inch balls and brown them up in some oil and then set aside. Meanwhile, in a big soup pot get some chicken stock boiling and add in some chopped onions and celery. If you had fresh carrots, this would be the time to throw them in too, but we didn't. After boiling for 10 minutes, add in the balls of meat, bringing back to a slow boil. Then add in some frozen spinach that has been thawed mostly, and we had some canned sliced carrots which we put in at this point too. Cook about 5 more minutes. Add in some salt, pepper, sage and thyme to taste.

Normally, I prefer small pasta for this dish like a ditalini, but I have yet to find a wheat or multi-grain version, so I broke up some rotini, about 1 cup and put it in. Cook until pasta has cooked through, probably about 15 more minutes. This dish gets a 9 out of 10. Super yummy, it's hard to stop eating it, and it's superb the next day too!

Pasta Puttanesca

Is our Pasta Puttanesca the real thing? Maybe not, based on some of the recipes we've found online... Truthfully, however, our version sounds better because we make it with chicken and fresh (not canned) tomatoes. Unlike a deep, long-simmered pasta sauce (which we love, but...), our puttanesca recipe is a quick and fresh-tasting version of this famous "whore's pasta". From Wikipedia:

The name originated in Naples after the local women of easy virtue. Puttana means "lady of the night" (i.e. a prostitute), but the reason why the dish gained such a name is debated. One possibility is that the name is a reference to the sauce's hot, spicy flavor and smell. Another is that the dish was offered to prospective customers at a low price to entice them into a house of ill repute. According to chef Jeff Smith of the Frugal Gourmet, its name came from the fact that it was a quick cheap meal that prostitutes could prepare between customers.

Fun! What's better than a dish with a spotty history?

Our version of puttanesca goes down very quickly - we don't start with the sauce until we drop the pasta (whole wheat penne) into the boiling water. The whole dish takes 12 minutes from the time the pasta goes in, so quick is an apt description. Because it all happens so fast, we like to sous everything up before hand:

• Chicken breasts cut into big-bite-size-ish pieces
  
• Flour seasoned with black pepper, kosher salt, and a little onion/garlic powder
  
• Five big plum tomatoes seeded and chopped into nice-sized chunks
  
• A bunch of Spanish/pimento-stuffed olives (a few handfulls, maybe a little less than a cup) roughly chopped
  
• A few tablespoons of drained capers
  
• Anchovy paste - in a tube
  
• Two lemons cut in half - for juice
  
• Parmesan cheese - in the green can or fresh grated, if you're cool like that

Water boiling, penne goes in and the timer is set for seven minutes. Chicken chunks get dredged in the seasoned flour - just a very light coating - and then added to a hot pan with olive oil in it. Brown the pieces on the first side (3-4 minutes), then turn over. Squeeze one of those lemon half's worth of juice on there and continue to cook a few minutes. Then add the chopped olives and capers and a couple squirts of anchovy paste - whatever your tastes are - and a couple more squeezes of lemon juice and mix that together. After another minute, add the tomatoes, salt and pepper, and any more lemon juice to taste - and stir to combine.

At this point, the pasta should be done and drained. After two minutes, we're ready to add the pasta and a generous amount of parmesan cheese. Fold all of this together and serve hot!



We LOVE the very briney anchovy-and-olive-and-caper flavor of this dish... some people don't, however, and you can easily modify this recipe to your taste. Instead of the capers and anchovy paste, add fresh basil (at the end, with the tomotoes) and mushrooms. Or spinach. Regardless, you'll have a fresh-tasting chicken pasta dish that produces, yup... GREAT LEFTOVERS!

Grazie,

Il Chef De Boston

Oven-Fried Chicken and Baked Spaghetti

Ever-searching for that perfect chicken recipe... juicy inside, crispy outside, yet not dripping in fat/oil. We may have found it in this Oven-Fried Chicken.

Two split breasts (bone-in) were finally ready to be cooked so we threw them in a brine consisting of cold water, salt, sugar, hot sauce, worcestershire, a dash of liquid smoke and some bay leaves and let them await their fate in the fridge for an hour and a half.

The recipe is easy enough after that - preheat oven to 425. Throw a tablespoon pat of butter in a baking dish (enameled cast iron, glass, or whatever you got) and put that in the oven for the butter to melt. Meanwhile, mix the following in a big freezer bag: flour (about 1/3 cup whole wheat mixed with about 1/3 cup all-purpose), paprika (a tbls or two), salt (a good amount), ground black pepper, and garlic powder. Take the chicken out of the brine and pat dry with a paper towel and - one at a time - place the chicken in the bag and shake to coat. Pull out and shake off any excess and place, skin-side down, into the buttered dish. Repeat with all the chicken. In the oven for 20 minutes, then turn skin-side up and go for another 20-30 minutes depending on the size of your breasts...


Make sure the juices run clear and pull out and let rest. These came out PERFECT - juicy, tender white meat and a delicious, crispy crust that tasted and felt like legitimate fried chicken. A HUGE find, this recipe - we highly recommend it!

We got creative with what to have with the chicken - we had a list of ingredients and we improvised: whole wheat spaghetti, 28 oz. can of tomatoes, package of frozen spinach, shredded cheddar and jack cheese, garlic, olive oil... Our friend described her baked macaroni and cheese earlier in the day, so we thought "let's combine all this stuff in a dish and bake it!".. and hope for the best.

Cook the pasta al dente. Meanwhile, thaw and thoroughly drain the spinach - squeezing out all excess liquid. Combine the spinach with the can of tomatoes, reserving the liquid from the tomatoes. Mix in a small handful of the shredded cheese, some salt, red pepper flake, oregano, basil and stir that up. Put cooked pasta into glass baking dish with a little olive oil drizzled on the bottom. Add this spinach/tomato/cheese mixture and stir to combine. Top with another handful of cheese and add to the oven. When our chicken came out, we lowered the temp to 350 to finish this dish (ideally, this is in at 350 for 30 minutes).

Cooking this uncovered allowed that top layer of cheese and pasta to get a nice burnt crust that produces a great, nutty flavor in the whole wheat pasta. Next time we'll add some sauteed garlic for more flavor, but this came out great.

All-in-all, a fantastic dinner made mostly with stuff we had lying around the kitchen!

Sausage & Rotini Stuffed Acorn Squash

What is better than a meal served in a vegetable? Eating the bowl your dinner comes in is a wonderful treat. This recipe also gives us an opportunity to take our fabulous meat sauce in a totally different direction. We’ve made this several times, initially taking a cue from a recipe by Emeril on foodtv.com... "Baked Acorn Squash Filled with Italian Sausage and Rigatoni Pasta"

Start your basic sausage meat sauce. When you’re all set to put the sauce on simmer, cut 2 acorn squash in half, seed them and place flesh side up in a glass baking dish. Cover the bottom with water and cover the dish with foil. Bake at 375°F for ~ 45’ until just tender. In the meantime, cook up your favorite wheat pasta cutting your portion in half since this is not the main focus of the dish.

Remove squash from oven and drain the water out of the dish. Season the squash with S&P and place about a ½ cup cooked pasta in each squash half and mound with your sausage sauce overflowing the sauce a bit. Top with some shredded mozzarella and return to the hot oven for 15-20’ until cheese has melted and browned a bit. Half a squash is plenty for one serving, so can you say delicious leftovers?!!?!?!? We can!!!

Our Meat Sauce

There is really no other name for it - tomato-based (pasta) sauce with sausage, bacon, onions, garlic, squash, mushrooms, and fennel and other spices... Ragu, Red Sauce, Meat Sauce, whatever! You get it together and you cook it a while and you take it and pour it over the object of your desire - making pasta, bread, even lawn clippings taste fantastic! (Don't eat grass.) Let's do this - photoblog style!

Meat:
* Hot Italian Sausage (we got Perri) stripped of it's casing
* Bacon cut into one-inch pieces, we had some extra lying around that woulda gone bad before the weekend. Let's use it for the fat (and smokey flavor) in this sauce

Veggies:
onion in little 3/4 inch pieces, diced garlic, yellow summer squash in 1/4 round cubes, sliced mushrooms

Tomatoes:
two cans diced tomoatoes, two small cans tomato sauce

Spices:
freshly ground fennel, salt, pepper, oregano, basil

Pasta:
whole wheat Penne and Rigatoni to fill out the amount we need.

Liquid:
Red wine (cabernet sauvignon) to deglaze (about 1/3 cup)

LET'S GO!

Bacon goes in first to start rendering the fat, while this is going on take the sausage out of it's casing - just make a long, shallow slice lengthwise and turn that sucker out.



Also, get that water going for your pasta!

Add the sausage to the bacon/bacon fat and brown. As it cooks be sure to break it up along the way. As you can see here, we use a splatter screen to - what else? - try and minimize splatter all over the cooktop.



Browned and removed, drain most of the fat, leaving the burny bits from the sausage and bacon at the bottom. Refresh with a little olive oil if you wish and get the onions going. After a minute or so, add the garlic. After a few more minutes the yellow squash is ready to go in. Not long after that, the sliced mushrooms go in.


This is a good time to deglaze, although we could have (should have?) done it sooner, too. Add red wine and scrape the pan with a wooden spoon to incorporate the burny stuff at the bottom.

Allow the red wine to get nice and bubblin' to burn off the alcohol and really pull the flavors out of the Cabernet (use whatever you like!)

Cook and gently stir all this for maybe 4 or 5 minutes. With that veggie mixture in place, let's season:

We like adding freshly ground fennel seeds that go great with the sausage. We got this great grinder for our wedding from our friends Trish and Brooks - just throw the seeds in and twist. Voila! Ground fennel. We added fresh ground black pepper, coarse sea salt, and dried oregano and basil. (The tomoatoes we're about to add aren't seasoned at all.)

Spice Grinder w/Fennel:



Mix that together and we're ready to...

Add the tomatoes - throw them all in. Because we're not adding alot of liquid, the sauce will provide that liquidy texture and allow some time to cook all the flavors together. Once the tomatoes are up to temperature, go ahead and add the meat back in and combine. Set to low, cover with splatter screen, take a deep breath, and simmer.

At this point, a glass of that same cabernet is in order. After as long as you can take - 10-20 minutes, you're ready to go.


Drop your pasta in when you are about 10 minutes away from being ready. We use whole wheat penne and rigatoni tonight, as we had the ends of those two boxes. Boiling, salted water - 10 minutes til al dente!

The final product after some grated parmesan. That is a BIG plate... plenty of leftovers from this dish. We only boil enough pasta for one night, for leftovers we'll boil new pasta and reheat this sauce in the microwave and combine.


SCORE:
* Pasta Sauce Dinner - 9 out of 10. - Gold star - Super Duper - Grade A - Splendid!
The smokey flavor from the bacon and the fennel-y sausage and deglazed veggies are fantastic. We forgot the green pepper - maybe that woulda gave it that last point!

DELICIOUS! See you next time!

The Boston Chef