Cooking again!

It is symptomatic of my week that this blog post has disappeared once. And that I found a mouse nest in the cupboard under the oven today.  *sigh*    But it's my night to cook and I'm kind of pleased with it, so I'm going to post anyway.

No recipes really, today, because all of this is stuff I make without.  I just toss things together.  The menu is breaded chicken baked in the oven, zucchini stewed with onion and tomato, and couscous because I didn't have time to make anything else starchy. Late starts will do that. 

I only took half a chicken breast. Those were big pieces of chicken.



The chicken is easy, crunchy goodness, although it can't compare to fried cutlets. Still, baked is much healthier and not nearly as messy. Pounded it so it's all the same thickness, added a sprinkle of salt, and then dredged in flour, dipped it in egg wash, and dredged it in breadcrumbs. Let it sit for a bit and then laid it out on racks over a baking sheet and baked it in a hot oven until golden and cooked through.  Slightly overdone, but only slightly. It's still moist  after about 45min in a 375°F oven.  I think 35-40min would have been better.

I was low on breadcrumbs, panko in this case, but I think it's OK.  I beat a bit of olive oil into the egg wash to compensate for the lack of frying, and I added salt, pepper, and crumbled thyme to the flour dredge and the breadcrumbs.

The zucchini was simply peeled and cubed, and thrown into a pot where I'd browned some garlic and onions.  Added half a jar of canned tomatoes, and some salt, pepper, rosemary and thyme, and then let it stew at medium with the lid ajar so it could thicken as it cooked down.

Couscous is just whole wheat couscous made with water and a bit of olive oil. OK, and a dash of smoked paprika and some salt.

I'm amused that one of the chicken breasts looks like Taiwan, though. The other big one looked a bit like Australia if one squinted, but this one is actually pretty close. 

It amuses my father to notice things that look like Taiwan, so I asked him if he wanted to eat Taiwan or Australia, and he said he couldn't eat Taiwan. But he had to take a picture of it. So, of course, I had to take a picture of it to to document it here. Heh.

After I finish dinner, I'm going to crawl into a corner with a pint of ice cream.  I think this is an excellent plan, that will be made all the better with the cocktail I'm having with dinner that has just started to kick in. Such dissipation! I might even watch a movie. :D