Monday, February 09, 2009

A Meal Even 300 Year Old Monks Would Love

Well, yesterday was a bust since we didn't do anything very exciting, but we did drive around L.A. for a little bit and wound up at Barnes & Noble for a few hours sipping lattes and catching up on the gossip mags. I didn't mind though, since bookstores are my very favorite places to be.

Dinner was a treat though. I made the Chicken Frangelico, but with a slight alteration. Since we're not allowed to have liquor in the truck, instead of using actual Frangelico, I used
Torani Hazelnut flavored syrup. And instead of the sage and brown butter (didn't get out to buy sage) I made a hazelnut cream sauce instead. OMG, I think it may have actually been better!

The Frangelico web site says, "Frangelico is a traditional hazelnut liqueur – enjoyed neat, over ice, with coffee or in a wide variety of stylish cocktails. Produced in the Piedmont region of Northern Italy, its origins date back more than 300 years to the presences of early Christian monks living in the hills of that area. Its name is part of local legend – an abbreviation of Fra. Angelico, a hermit monk believed to have inhabited the magnificent Piedmont hills during the 17th century." But it doesn't just taste good in coffee and cocktails!

Here's the recipe: (sorry
Sheila, it is a chicken recipe!)

Chicken Frangelico

THE INGREDIENTS
Boneless, skinless chicken breast, pounded thin
Salt & Pepper
Frangelico or Hazelnut flavored syrup
Olive Oil
Butter
Heavy Cream (1 pint)
Fresh Mushrooms (sliced)
Pasta (I would use a tubular pasta [penne, rigatoni] or a pasta that will catch the sauce [radiatore, spirals, gemelli, fusilli, orrechiette] because it's light enough to just get stuck in the holes. I used mini-raviolis filled with butternut squash*. You should too!)

THE PROCESS
I have realized that if I plan on posting recipes, I'm going to have to get with providing some actual measurements. I don't measure when I cook, so it might be difficult for me. I'm going to estimate for the sake of this recipe. Wing it if you dare!

1. Coat the bottom of your frying pan with olive oil and add a nice big hunk of butter (3 tablespoons?).

2. Salt and pepper both sides if your chicken breast and put them in pan; cook until golden brown. No, I don't know how long. You know what golden brown is, right? If you're not sure, cut one of the thickest ones open and see if it looks done.

3. In a smaller, separate frying pan, add butter and olive oil (just to coat the bottom of the pan). When melted, throw in your mushrooms, salt and pepper them a teensy bit and then saute until you smell the mushroomy-ness of them and they look as if they've "wilted" a bit. You'll know when they're done, and when they are, just set them aside.

4. When your chicken is almost done, get your macaroni water boiling and keep an eye on it so you can have the pasta and the sauce part done about the same time, depending on what kind of pasta you're using. The mini-ravioli required 15 minutes, but most pasta requires less.

5. When your chicken is done, take it out of the pan and set it aside, keeping it hot if you can. Since I don't have a lot of room in the truck, I just wrapped it in tin foil, which worked. Deglaze (adding liquid and stirring to remove the bit of brown bits on the bottom of the pan) your pan with the Frangelico (or hazelnut syrup) by putting about 1/2 cup of the liqueur in the pan. If you're using actual liquor, you might want to use more since it does cook down.

6. After this step, check your pasta, which should almost be done. Now add the pint of heavy cream to the frying pan. Cook until the cream started to bubble, then add your mushrooms back in - you don't want your mushrooms to cook with the entire time because you don't want your sauce to taste too mushroomy.

7. Once the pasta is done, drain it and throw it back into the pot it was cooking in. Then dump all of the sauce in the frying pan into that pot and toss it with your pasta. At this point, I'm really hoping you could get squash ravioli since the combination of the hazelnut and the butternut squash is amaaaaaazing.

8. Then, plate your meal. A piece or two of chicken on each plate, a nice mound of mini-raviolis (or your pasta choice) on the side, and then a very light sprinkle of parsley for some color.

Voila! Truly delicious. The monks would be proud.

Click HERE for a printable version of the recipe.


* Because Jeni asked, this is the pasta I used and this is where I got it.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Please please please forgive my stupidity... Is the "no liquor in the truck" rule a corporate rule of your company or a federal rule for ALL truckers? Thanks!

The Daily Rant said...

Anonymous:

If you're a truck driver, you can find this regulation in the FMCSA (Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations) book. It is regulation 392.5(a)(3) Alcohol prohibition.

It states that "no driver shall be on duty or operate a commercial motor vehicle while the driver possesses wine of not less than one-half per centum of alcohol by volume, beer as defined in 26 U.S.C. 5052(a), of the Internal Revenue Code of 1954, and distilled spirits as defined in section 5002(a)(8), of such Code."

There is more to the regulation, but that's the gist of it. "Possession", as used in the regulation, does not include possession of substances which is manifested and transported as part of a shipment.

So in answer to your question, it applies to ALL drivers.

Gil said...

Your recipe sounds great. Show me the police officer or prosecutor that will believe you when you tell them the bottle is for cooking purposes only!

Jeni said...

This post was totally unfair -to me. Reading it, seeing the picture of that food at 6 a.m.. making me very hungry at the sight of that tantalizing stuff. Dang! Just not fair.
Where did you get the mini-raviolis with that kind of filling too?

Dreamybee said...

That sounds SO GOOD! Now I have to decide...do I ship in the mini raviolis because I'm sure there is nowhere here that I am going to find them, or do I get brave and try to make my own? I do have an acorn squash languishing in my fridge-I wonder if that would be the same?

Michelle | Bleeding Espresso said...

YUUUUUUM! And yes, measurements are the hardest part about publishing recipes on the blog. I can't tell you how many times I've had to make something again just to get measurements....