Later On

Okay, I’m trying one:

Savory Port-Mushroom Chicken

Olive-oil spray
1/4 medium onion, thinly sliced
1 cup bow-tie pasta (farfalle)
1/2 to 3/4 lb chicken breasts or thighs
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 large Portobello mushroom, halved and thinly sliced
2 Tbsp ruby port
1 tsp balsamic vinegar
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
1/2 tsp Dijon mustard
2 tsp olive oil
one 3-inch fresh rosemary sprig, or 1 tsp dried rosemary, crushed
2 c cut green beans or snow pea pods

Preheat oven to 450º F.

Spray the inside and lid of a cast-iron Dutch oven with olive oil.

Scatter the onions in the pot. Add the pasta and 1/3 c of water. Stir to coat the pasta and distribute it in an even layer.

Add the chicken to the pot and lightly season with salt and pepper. Arrange the mushrooms in a layer on top of the chicken.

In a small bowl, mix the port, vinegar, Worcestershire sauce, mustard, olive oil, and 1 Tbsp of water. Stir with a whisk or fork to emulsify the mustard, then drizzle into the pot.

Add the carrots and tuck the rosemary spring into a crevice. Top with a layer of green beans.

Cover and bake for 45 minutes, or until 3 minutes after the aroma of a fully cooked meal escapes the oven. Serve immediately.

That’s from Yarnell’s Glorious One-Pot Meals. I did notice I had to reject quite a few recipes as unsuitable to a weight-loss diet, though I think they’ll be fine on maintenance.

In this making of it, I used whole-wheat rotini as the pasta, and 1/2 lb chicken breast. (This serves two—or, for me, two meals.) I didn’t have Worcestershire sauce (I’m planning to make some), so I used A1 sauce. I used dried rosemary and fresh green beans, which I cut into short sections. Cutting the carrots was made much easier by the Borner Swissmar V-Slicer.

It was rather fun building the layers. I didn’t want to cook the half chicken breast (8.2 oz) in one piece, so I cut it into strips and they made a nice layer.

It’s cooking now.

UPDATE: Not bad at all, but probably a stretch to term it “glorious.” OTOH, I did substitute A1 for Worcestershire sauce. Still, I get the idea and I think with my own choices of herbs and spices it can be much better. And what I have is not bad at all.

It was a good idea to cut the chicken into strips, and I think next time I will cut it into chunks to make it easier to spoon out the finished dish: you have to push the spoon down to the bottom so you can get something from each layer.