Chicken Scampi, Green Beans, and Truffle Brownie Cups

Let's start with the chicken scampi:

Here are the basics of what you'll need. We'll talk about spicing it up a bit in a moment...

• 1/2 cup (1 stick or 113 g) butter 
• 1/4 cup olive oil 
• 1 teaspoon dried parsley (or a sprig of chopped fresh parsley) 
• 1 teaspoon dried basil (or a sprig of chopped fresh basil - just the leaves though) 
• 1/4 teaspoon dried oregano (or a short sprig of fresh oregano - again, just the leaves)
• 3 cloves garlic, minced (This can be bought in a jar OR you can mince garlic with a garlic press. If you have neither just chop it up a bit) 
• 3/4 teaspoon salt 
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice (Preferably from an actual lemon, but fake plastic bottle that looks like a lemon will do.) 
• 4 boneless chicken breast halves, sliced lengthwise into thirds 
• 1 package of long pasta (or make your own!) - fettuccine or linguine would be nice

Directions 

sauce on the back burner

1. In a medium to large sized skillet (something wide and flat) heat the butter or margarine and oil over medium high until the butter/margarine melts. Add the garlic and salt to the pot and mix them in a bit. If you are using dry herbs add them now, but if your lucky enough to have some fresh, wait a bit so you get more taste from them. This is where you can go crazy. Love the taste of parsley, then pile it on. Basil make you nauseous? Leave it out. Why not try some rosemary or thyme? These spices suggested are fairly italian so we wouldn't recommend going outside of this family (a.k.a. allspice probably won't fair well in this recipe). Make this sauce your own! After you're done gettin' busy, stir in the lemon juice. If you're a fan of lemon juice, double it.
2. Toss in (ok, not literally) the chicken and saute (a.k.a let it cook) for about 3 minutes or until it looks white. Lower the heat and cook for it about 10 to 15 minutes or until chicken is cooked through and the juices run clear when you press on the chicken a little. (Try to not overcook the chicken or else it will start to get tough.) If you're using fresh herbs add them 1 to 2 minutes before you serve.

Serve the chicken scampi over linguine or fettuccine pasta.... or anything else you have lying around. We l.o.v.e. fresh pasta so Austin whipped some up for our dinner tonight. If you want to make fresh pasta he follows a method similar to this one. Once you're used to it, it's really not that much effort, but if it's a first for time with this kind of recipe, some store bought pasta would be perfect too.


On to the veggie...
For the green beans you'll need...

• Fresh Green beans 
• Celery Seed 
• Salt and Pepper 

Directions:

1. Rinse your beans and snip off the ends. Cut them however you like. For our dinner tonight, we sliced them lengthwise. You can leave them whole, cut them diagonally, or cut them lengthwise twice. 
2. Fill a pot up with a little bit of water (maybe an inch) and insert a steamer. If you don't have a steamer, just put the green beans directly in the water. Put the green beans in the steamer and cover the lid. Check on your beans every once in awhile by tasting one. Everyone likes their beans different, so cook them as long as you like. (You can also boil the beans in a pot of water, but steaming allows more of the nutrients from the beans to stay in the beans rather than get lost in the water.) 
3. Remove the green beans from the pot and put them in a bowl. Season with celery seed, salt, and pepper as you like. If you have celery salt rather than celery seed, then skip the regular salt. Try other seasonings too! 

chicken scampi, fresh pasta, and celery infused green beans

... and Kayti's favorite part of the meal... dessert...truffle brownie cups...
This recipe comes from The Pampered Chef.
You'll need:

• 1 2/3 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
• 2 tbsp. butter
• 1/2 c. sugar
• 1 egg
• 2/3 c. flour
• 3/4 c. heavy whipping cream

Directions:

Our homemade double boiler

1. Preheat the oven to 325F. Grease and flour a mini-muffin pan. We used vegetable oil in a re-fillable bottle like this one. To flour a pan, just spoon a pinch of flour into each cup. Hold the pan over the sink and knock it around until the bottoms and sides are coated. 
2. Place 2/3 of the chocolate morsels and butter in a small metal bowl inserted into a small cooking pot filled with an inch of boiling water. This is called "double-boiling." It's a great way to melt chocolate, especially if you don't have a microwave. (If you do have a microwave, but the chocolate and butter in a microwave safe bowl for 40-60 seconds and stir halfway through.) Stir the chocolate regularly until it's smooth. (Note: I (Kayti) actually forgot to add the butter---whoops--and they still came out delicious.) 
3. Transfer the metal bowl to your counter and add the sugar and egg. 
4. Add the flour and mix until it's incorporated. (Since I forgot to add the butter, I noticed the consistency was a little off, so I didn't add all the flour.) 
5. Divide the batter evenly among the mini-muffin wells. We used a small cookie scoop (2 tsp. size). Press each one down so that it is flat. We have this handy tool from The Pampered Chef for making little tartlets. 
6. Bake 10-12 minutes or until the edges are set. Don't over cook these bad boys. The first batch...er... I forgot to set the timer and well... 
7. Microwave the cream for 1-2 minutes (or heat using the double boiler method mentioned above) until hot and stir in 1 cup of the chocolate chips. Wisk it until it's smooth and then stick it in the freezer for 10-12 minutes. Check on it halfway through and give it another wisk. 
8. Spoon this lovely chocolate sauce (called a ganache) into a resealable plastic bag. (If you fold the top of the bag down a few inches, it will be much less messy.) 
9. When they're finished, pull the brownies from the oven and cool for 2 minutes. Then press each one with your finger to make a little well (we used our nifty tartlet tool mentioned previously). Let them cool another 3 minutes. 
10. Remove the brownies from the pan. 
11. Cut off a SMALL corner of the plastic bag with your ganache (always start small... you can always cut bigger) and squeeze a bit of the ganache into each brownie well. This is called "piping." 

Beautifulness....

As far as pacing goes for this whole meal the major hang ups are going to be the prep work for the brownie truffles, slicing the green beans, and the pasta if you're going to make it fresh. Cooking the chicken, green beans and pasta can all happen pretty much simultaneously-- and if you're feeling confident you should go for that (so that everything will be warm-ish). If you're not so adventurous, take your time and do one at a time to make sure you still have some fun in the kitchen.

Once the brownies have cooked and been pressed, the ganache has cooled, beans are cut and the pasta is ready to be cooked, you should make sure you have a large pot of water boiling. From here everything happens pretty quick so hold on tight, and good luck!