{073:365} Delicious

I always do too much, or so a very astute Mia commented last night. And she’s right, but she’s also wrong. Because while dinner may have been later than planned, and we all might have been a few drinks ahead of where we should have been, the meal itself was DELICIOUS! That is if it’s not too vain to say that about your own cooking?

For dinner I decided to push my pasta making skills to the limit and make enough fettucini for five of us. That’s a lot of pasta rolling! Good thing I had everyone egging me on…

To go over it I made a shallot mushroom cream sauce with chicken (recipe at the bottom of this post). Plus a side of homegrown, and previously frozen, green beans – they maybe could have used a more creative treatment, but my attention was elsewhere at the time and I didn’t really have a good plan for them other than butter.

While I was busy rolling and sauteing, Mia was gracious enough to clean some lettuce from the polytunnel (and check for slugs) and make a salad. So pretty.

For dessert? A chocolate fudge cake with local hazelnuts. Oh my god, so good. Especially with the last of a very special bottle of Tuscan wine that I bought while in Italy last year. I intended to drink it for my 30th birthday last year, but instead we drank it in late celebration of my 31st last night.

Just what I needed on a cold and rainy Saturday night. Hopefully everyone will come back again if I promise to feed them earlier next time?

*****

Mushroom Shallot Chicken Fettucini
Serves 6

For Pasta:
2 cups all purpose flour
4 large eggs

For Sauce / Chicken:
6 quite small chicken breasts (from our chickens) – maybe 3 or 4 standard size
2 pints mushrooms, roughly chunked
2 shallots, minced  
6 cloves garlic, chopped
1-1/2 pints heavy cream
1/2 cup of fresh grated parmesan
kosher salt and fresh ground pepper
pinch of Italian seasoning
olive oil
3 Tbs butter

Make your pasta dough by combining the eggs and flour until they form a rough ball of dough. Knead a couple of times on a floured surface, then wrap in plastic wrap and set aside for at least 30 minutes. Then roll either by hand or with a pasta machine, adding flour as needed. Cut into fettucini, toss with corn meal to keep it from sticking together and set aside until needed.

Heat the olive oil in a deep skillet or dutch oven over medium-high heat. Cut your chicken into large bite-sized pieces. Add to hot oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Cook until done and starting to turn golden brown – 10 minutes at most. Remove to plate and cover.

Turn heat down to medium and add butter to drippings in the pan. Add mushrooms and shallots to the pan and saute until tender, 8-9 minutes. At the same time, start your salted pasta water and bring it to a boil.

Add garlic to mushrooms and shallots and cook another minute or two. Add the Italian seasoning (or fresh herbs in season) and salt and pepper to taste. Add the cream and bring it all to a gentle simmer. Add the parmesan and put the chicken back in. Stir often as the cream slightly thickens. This is going to be a thin sauce that just coats the pasta.

Cook your pasta, about 4 minutes or so. Drain and add to pot with sauce, toss to coat. Turn into serving bowl and serve while hot.

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