Eat Your Noodles!

Today is both Johnny Applseed Day and Eat Your Noodles Day. Noodles and pasta are the same, right? Okay, we don’t call Chicken Noodle Soup Chicken Pasta Soup, but we could.

In the past, we’ve shared dishes that are traditionally noodle based with a heavy Asian influence. Dishes such as Spicy Asian Noodle Soup, Sriracha Shrimp Noodle Soup and Shrimp Pancit for both Eat Your Noodles as well as a Lenten Friday. While all of these dishes have been amazingly delicious, it’s high time to go in another direction, don’t you think?

While we’re all fans of Asian cuisine, I wanted to play around with a new chicken recipe. Kiddo hasn’t been a fan of Christmas Eve every since I started honoring the Italian-American tradition of Seven Fishes. Some years we go all out, other times it’s much more modified and thereby simplified. Recently, I make him a chicken dish by substituting a piece of chicken just for him in our Dover Sole. This is a more elaborate production of what has been a simple fish dish in the past. One of the things I’ve learned over the years is chicken and fish recipes are easy to interchange just as veal and pork can be switched. Making these simple changes created a whole new dish. That’s the beauty of cooking rather than baking. More room to play. To be a great baker, you need to understand how things work togehter on a chemical level. To be a great cook, you just need to understand flavors and textures. At least that’s my opinion. I’m not trained by any stretch of the imagination. Without training, I can try whatever – and learn by both failures as well as sucesses. This is one of those sucesses.

Lemon Caper Chicken over Angel Hair Pasta
4 small boneless Chicken Breasts
2 Garlic Cloves
1 Lemon
2 tablespoons Parsley
2 tablespoons Capers
Salt to taste
Black Pepper to taste
1/2 cup Flour
2 tablespoons Vegetable Oil or as needed
1 cup Chicken Stock
1/4 cup Lemon Juice
3 tablespoons Butter
6 oz Angel Hair Pasta

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil on a back burner. Maintain boil until ready to use. Heat oven to 300-degrees. Place a serving platter in the oven to warm.

Cut chicken breasts in half to create 8 smaller breasts. Place breast, one at a time, inside a quarts ziplock bag. With the flat side of a meat mallet, flatten the chicken. Season with salt and pepper; set aside until ready to use.

Peel and finely mince garlic, thinly slice lemon and mince parsley. Set aside. Rinse and pat dry capers.

Place flour in a pie tin or shallow plate; dredge chicken in flour. Shake off excess flour, set chicken aside. Heat the vegetable oil in a skillet; pan-fry the chicken medallions until golden brown on both sides, about 3 minutes per side. Work in batches if necessary to not over-crowd skillet, adding oil as need. Place chicken on the warmed platter as it cooks. Hold in the oven. Once finished with the chicken, drain most of the oil from the skillet, leaving a thin coating on the surface of the pan.

Stir minced garlic in the skillet until fragrant, about 20 seconds. Pour in chicken stock. Scrape to loosen and dissolve any browned bits from the bottom of the pan. Stir in the lemon slices. Bring mixture to a boil, let cook, stirring occasionally, until the sauce reduced to about 2/3-cup, about 7 minutes.

Add lemon juice and capers; simmer until the sauce has further reduced and thickened slightly, about 5 minutes longer. Drop the butter into the skillet and swirl pan to incorporate butter into the sauce. Remove from heat, add parsley to the sauce. Return chicken to the skillet, keep warm.

Cook Angel hair Pasta al-dente in the boiling water, about 3 minutes. Drain well. Spread pasta out on the serving platter. Arrange chicken medallions over the pasta, then spoon sauce over each portion before serving.

To complete this dish, serve with Char-Braised Basil Asparagus.

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I will praise You, Lord, for You have rescued me