C's Oven Chicken

I'm still a little bit bruised from being crushed by Jet Blue, and need to distract myself while I wait for a response from customer service, which will surely be disappointing. Thus, I'm happy to report that I made some progress in getting through my Costco purchases last night!

I made one of my favorite, easy stand-bys, which I will share with you. My best friend calls this "C's Oven Chicken" because in the recipe I sent her, I said to "pre-heat the oven at whatever temperature you cook chicken," and she derived the name of my dish from that comment. (And it turns out I was cooking my chicken at 350, when it should be more like 400, oops! No wonder it took so long!)

Ingredients:
2 Skinless chicken breasts (I used frozen ones from Trader Joe's, ~$1 each, comes in a bag of 8)
1 Can of stewed tomatoes (I had these from my Costco trip at $0.62/can)
1 yellow squash and 1 green squash/zucchini* (Usually costs me about $1 for both)
Wheat pasta* (Also acquired at Costco, $1/box, I used about 1/3 box)

Directions:
*Pre-heat the oven at whatever temperature you cook chicken (Trader Joe's suggests 400 degrees)
*Slice squash, arrange them with thawed chicken breasts in a casserole dish
*Pour stewed tomatoes and juice over the chicken and squash
*Cook until chicken is no longer pink, consuming undercooked poultry can cause foodborne illnesses, blah blah
*Prepare wheat pasta on stovetop while chicken is cooking

Ta da! Serves 2. Put the chicken + veggies + tomatoes over the pasta, or next to it, or under it. The juices from the tomato (use all the juice in the can) make the squash tender and flavorful. Plus, you can get stewed tomato varieties with garlic and onion in them if you like those flavors.

This is so easy, I came home from the gym, whipped it up in under 5 minutes, and let it cook while I showered. A tip for defrosting frozen chicken fast: fill a pot with VERY hot water and submerge the frozen items- as the water cools, refill with hot water, but before you know it, your frozen food will be thawed. Thicker items take longer.

Total cost of meal for two: $3.95, $4.22 if you count the diet coke I drank while cooking :)

*Variations on a theme:
Other veggies that work well include green beans or broccoli, but it's probably better to steam those than to put in the oven with the chicken for so long, as the tomato juice will make them soggy. Time saver for steaming veggies if you have a steamer pot that fits on top of a regular pot: steam the veggies on top of your pasta water! Just be careful that not too many broccoli bits fall into the pasta water, ha.

Additionally, instead of whole wheat pasta (my healthy preference), I sometimes use brown rice or even orzo.


Now, only 7 cans of stewed tomatoes and 7.66 boxes of pasta to go (in additon to all the other food I haven't eaten yet).