Old Faithful

Balsamic Chicken with Baby Spinach and Couscous (pg 205 of The Food You Crave) has been one of my fallback "crap, I don't have time for this" recipes for several years now. It's easy. So very, very easy. Especially for a three-part meal that does manage to come together as greater than its individual parts.

Make couscous: Zip! Pound chicken breasts, add salt and pepper, then cook them through in olive oil. Remove from pan. Zam! In the same pan, add more oil, garlic, then the spinach. Wilt. Remove from pan. Zoom! Throw crushed tomatoes, chicken broth, and balsamic vinegar in the same pan, and cook it down for a few minutes. Layer the components, pour some of the sauce on top. Kapow! Done. And all it took was one pot and one pan.

 Conclusion: Like it's flavor, love it's ease.

I asked for a mini muffin pan for Christmas, thinking that maybe Charlie would be more interested in muffin items if they were scaled down to size. To test this theory, and in hopes that I'd get some small amount of a vegetable into him, I baked Pumpkin Pie Muffins (pg 21) today.

May I just say, it pisses me off when a recipe--especially for something like a muffin, which could be made in any quantity--doesn't use a whole can of pumpkin. What exactly am I supposed to do with less than half a can of pumpkin? Scale the recipe up to use the whole thing, Ellie. Come on.

Mama Muffin gives her babies a goodbye hug. I told her I was sending them to live on a farm.

Wastefulness aside, these muffins are good. I could use more spice (and more pumpkin. Ahem), but they were good. Not as good as my friend Hilary's mom's Pumpkin Bread, but it also has less butter and sugar.

Conclusion: Liked it, and I think they're Charlie Approved. He nibbled one throughout the afternoon, but he didn't spit it out. I guess that counts.