Chicken Florentine Pasta

{The Pioneer Woman}
Start to Finish: about 30 minutes
Serves: she says 10... I got about 8...

This recipe comes from the wonderful Pioneer Woman! Here's the post if you want to check it out - her's is way prettier than mine! I have copied her ingredients and instructions verbatim because... she already wrote it... and I don't feel like re-typing it!

Ingredients

• 1 pound Penne
• 4 whole Boneless, Skinless Chicken Breasts
• Salt And Pepper, to taste
• 2 Tablespoons Butter
• 2 Tablespoons Olive Oil
• 4 cloves Garlic, Minced
• 3/4 cups Dry White Wine
• 3/4 cups Low-sodium Broth, More If Needed
• 1 bag Baby Spinach
• 2 cups Grape Tomatoes, Halved Lengthwise
• 4 ounces, weight Parmesan Cheese, Shaved With Vegetable Peeler

Preparation Instructions

Cook pasta according to package directions in lightly salted water. Drain and set aside.
Cut chicken breasts into chunks and sprinkle on salt and pepper.
Heat butter and olive oil over high heat in a large skillet. Add chicken chunks in a single layer and do not stir for a minute or two in order to allow the chicken to brown on the first side {I didn't do this... which is probably why her chicken was so much golder and prettier than mine...}. Turn the chicken and brown on the other side. Cook until done, then remove chicken from the skillet.

Turn heat to medium. Add garlic and quickly stir to avoid burning.

After about 30 seconds, pour in wine and broth {I did all broth... no wine - she said that you could just replace the wine with more broth if you wanted to, and I didn't have wine}, stirring to deglaze the pan. Allow the liquid to bubble up, then continue cooking until it's reduced by at least half (most of the surface of the liquid should be bubbling at this point.)
Turn off the heat. Add spinach,

tomatoes,

chicken,

and cooked pasta to the skillet.

Toss to combine; the spinach will wilt as you toss everything. Add plenty of Parmesan shavings and toss to combine. {I also added more pepper... because I love pepper!}

Serve with extra Parmesan shavings. {First of all... I'm a little annoyed with the focus of this picture... It did not do what I wanted. I also added some more Parmesan and pepper after this photo}

***

This was pretty easy, and pretty tasty. It's not so good for the "cooking for 1... or 2" part of it, unless you're looking for quite a bit of leftovers. I put a little bit in the freezer - I always like to see how that works out! And I've got more left over to feed me for the rest of the week!

On a personal note... I hate cooking with oil... I very much dislike getting burned... so I may have put a long sleeved sweatshirt on just to cook this... and got really hot over the stove, but only got burned once! So... I did cook the chicken with the oil... and I probably would the next time too (because it's also a part of the "sauce" and I think it would change the flavor), but I so don't want to... stinking popping oil!

Sesame Noodles

{Recipe from The Pioneer Woman}

Ingredients:
Pasta (You choose: rice, spaghetti, linguine, angel hair)
1/4 c soy sauce
3-4 cloves (or tsp) of garlic
3 T sugar
2 T rice vinegar
2-3 T sesame oil
1/2 t hot chili oil (can add 1T of red pepper flakes - or less if you don't like as much heat - if you don't have any hot chili oil)
4-5 T canola oil
1-2 T hot water
(optional - add a tablespoon or two of sweet thai chili sauce)

Instructions:
1. Prepare noodles as instructed by box.
2. Mix together the remaining ingredients over low heat on the stove.
3. If you'd like to, steam/stir fry some veggies, meat, peanuts, etc.
4. Drain the noodles.
5. Add the sauce (and veggies/meat if you prepared that), mix, and serve!

**NOTE to cooks, this creates a huge amount of sauce. If you're preparing about half a box (possibly a whole box) of pasta, using about 1/2 of the rest of the ingredients will probably work. This is not very spicy in the amounts shown. If you like your food a little bit spicier, add some extra hot chili sauce (my friend and I halved the other ingredients, but left the amount of hot chili sauce).