Tomato Week: Roasted Cherry Tomatoes with Angel Hair Pasta and Homemade Croutons

I have posted about roasting tomatoes a few times before, but can't have tomato week and not talk about roasting cherry tomatoes. I hope by now you guys have tried my absolute favorite way to use up a lot of the little bite-sized tomatoes - cut them in half and put in a shallow roasting dish, toss with a little olive oil and coarse salt (other seasonings are up to you - pepper, Italian blend, whatever), and bake at 350' to 400' until you like the consistency stirring occasionally. The longer they bake the more they thicken up and turn into an almost glazed texture which is so so so good (!), shorter time is still good and keeps them a little 'fresher' and lighter texture - just depends on what you want to do with them.

For this dish I let the tomatoes really cook down, at least an hour (turn the temp down if they seem like they are cooking too fast - you'l know if they start to turn too dark but not getting thick and syrupy), then tossed them (including the juice and olive oil) with cooked angel hair pasta. Another one of our favorites is to add homemade croutons (click to see how I make them, very easy!) to red-sauced pasta - almost like a panzanella bread salad, the croutons soak up the sauce but still add a little texture to the dish. Nothing like adding bread to pasta to keep this dish low-carb LOL. Whatever, it's good. For a little more color and to beef up the veggies I added some chopped fresh spinach this time - add whatever else you like...cooked mushrooms, peas, chopped asparagus or broccoli would all be good.

Oh man do I love this pasta and roasted tomatoes SO MUCH!!!


one year ago: morning glory muffins
two years ago: Japanese steakhouse carrot-ginger salad dressing

My Sister's Birthday Dinner (aka: Quebec Chicken)

For my sister's birthday she requested Quebec Chicken - a dish we have been making forever. So this may or may not be a stolen recipe, it's a long ancient story - let's just say I heard it from a friend who, heard it from a friend who, heard it from another... and leave it at that! Wherever it came from and however I got it, it's an excellent recipe and we are all crazy for it (oh, and for the record I changed the name to protect the innocent hahaha!! ). 

Ingredients:

• 1 pound chicken tenders
• a couple sweet peppers (I like to do different colors), chopped in bite sized pieces
• 1 small onion, chopped in bite sized pieces
• 1 cup sour cream
• 1 cup mayonnaise
• 1 cup grated parmesan
• 1 T. montreal steak seasoning
• 1 t. lemon pepper
• 2 T. olive oil
• 1 pound cooked angel hair pasta

Directions:

Cut the chicken tenders in half (big bite sized pieces), put in a big bowl. Drizzle with a little olive oil and sprinkle with the montreal steak seasoning and lemon pepper, toss to coat evenly. Sauté chicken in the remaining olive oil in a large saucepan, turning once, a couple minutes on each side. Remove chicken from pan and add the peppers and onions, sauté for a few minutes until softened. Add the chicken back to the pan and then stir in the sour cream, mayo, and parmesan. I like to add additional montreal seasoning but that is up to you. Bake in a large casserole dish 1 hour until bubbly, serve over the pasta.

note: I normally double this - we rarely have leftovers, and the sauce is so good you'll want lots of it! Cover for the first half hour, then remove the cover so it browns a little bit. The sauce is super thick to start but will loosen up as it bakes. There are a bunch of people in the family that don't like peppers and onions so I don't usually add them to the sauce, bake them in a small dish separately and then whoever wants them can add to the chicken and pasta - if everyone at your house likes peppers and onions though, the sauce tastes even better if you bake them all together. I've made it with broccoli and mushrooms which is also good - but I personally like the onions the best!) 

OMG this is so good - you guys are gonna love it!