Baked Chicken and Pasta

I have a lot of catching up to do. Beware, this blog is about to bombarded with lots more food and pictures!

This particular post will focus on my awesome home cooking. woo!

Last week, I called Glenn and asked him what he wanted for dinner. As per usual, he replied, "Chicken!" Standard Glenn. Luckily, I had chicken (broiler-fryer) in the freezer. So I decided to bake the chicken and make the pasta I always make when I'm too lazy to try something new.

I found a simple recipe on cooks.com for Lemon and Garlic Baked Chicken and only had to make a few modifications. Here's the recipe, including my own changes to the recipe.

Ingredients

1 (2 - 2 1/2 lb.) broiler fryer, quartered
1 lg. clove garlic, crushed (I LOOOOOOVE garlic, so I put 5 cloves of MINCED garlic)
1/2 tsp. salt
2 tsp. rosemary leaves
Several twits freshly ground black pepper
1 tsp. grated lemon rind
1/3 c. lemon juice
1/2 c. water

Directions

1. Rinse chicken; pat dry. Place chicken skin side down in a shallow baking dish.

2. Combine garlic, salt, rosemary, pepper and lemon rind. Sprinkle over chicken. Pour lemon juice and water over all. Bake, uncovered in preheated 400 degree oven for 30 minutes.

3. Turn chicken quarters. Baste with pan liquids. Continue baking about 25 to 30 minutes or until chicken is tender. Makes 4 servings, approximately 196 calories per serving. (I skin my chicken for less calories.) I left the skin on because Glenn loves crispy chicken skin. How can I deny him such small pleasures?

Because the pieces of chicken were cut up as opposed to baking a whole chicken, it was easier to make sure that each piece was cooked just right. I took out the smaller pieces, such as the wings and drumsticks, before the larger pieces, preventing the meat from drying out or burning.

Earlier in the month, I baked an entire chicken and I found it to be not as tender or tasty. Also, I was completely grossed out by the process of stuffing the chicken. Ewwwwwwwww.

I think I will stick to using cut up broilerfryer chicken and this recipe.

On to the super easy pasta that I ripped off Giada's Everyday Italian

In the original recipe, from what I remember seeing on TV, Giada uses penne pasta. I never have penne pasta on hand, but almost always have whole wheat spaghetti. Plus, in my personal opinion, penne pasta should be baked.

Ingredients

Whole Wheat Spaghetti
Ricotti Cheese
Olive Oil
Cherry or Grape Tomatoes (I like to cut the tomatoes in half)
Spinach
LOTS of garlic (minced)
salt
pepper (for taste)

Directions

1. Boil Spaghetti
2. While Spaghetti is boiling, heat up olive oil in a large pan on medium heat. Be generous with the olive oil as it will serve as the sauce for the pasta.
3. Add garlic. Once you can smell the garlic, add the spinach and tomatoes. Add some sea salt.
4. Lower the heat to medium-low flame. Add spaghetti and ricotta cheese. Mix well so that the mixture of the cheese and olive oil makes a sauce and coats all of the pasta.
5. Add pepper for taste.
6. If the pasta seems a little dry, simply add pasta water.

DONE! Easy, no?

Once again, I have no measurements for you folks because I'm too lazy to measure while I'm in the kitchen so it's all about eyeballing the ingredients.