Sundried Tomato Herb Chicken & Pasta, an easy chicken recipe with breaded chicken, pasta, and sundried tomato butter that is perfect for any night.
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Sundried Tomato Herb Chicken & Pasta is a quick and easy dinner for any night! I recently asked my Snappy Gourmet FACEBOOK friends if they’d like my next recipe to be a cocktail or a chicken entrée, and chicken won by a landslide! Guess we all like chicken?! But no worries if you’re a cocktail fan, I have a new FABULOUS cocktail coming soon!
Ever buy a package of boneless chicken breasts and wondered what to do with it? Well, here you go! Sundried Tomato Herb Chicken & Pasta is easy! I’ll give you some ideas for some variations to use what you have around your house and some ideas how to make this recipe healthier as well as ideas to make it creamier and more decadent. Perfect for any family or diet!
To make quick dinner and pasta dishes, I like to keep a few things around the house. I always try to keep some broth or stock in the house. You can also make your own stock and keep it in small containers (or ice cube trays) in the freezer. If you have a little broth/stock you can make a quick pan sauce for any meal in no time! Wine or beer are also great additions to quick pan sauces.
If you like your sauces creamy, heavy cream or cream cheese are good additions. The sauce for this recipe is a little on the thin side, so if you like thicker sauces, add a little cornstarch mixed in water. Keep some frozen veggies around to bulk up any sauce or some fresh mushrooms or onions to give you a few more ideas. See what you have around the house such as cheeses and herbs to also add to any sauce. Lots of possibilities!
When I cook dinner for my family, I like to cook a little bigger than what we need so that we can have leftovers or freeze what’s left for another meal. If you’re going through the trouble of cooking, cook big! So this recipe technically serves 8, or 2 dinners for a family of 4 (assuming your husband doesn’t eat all the leftovers for lunch the next day…). You could easily cut the recipe in half.
To start, place a covered pot of water for the pasta on your stove and bring to a boil. Have your side veggies ready to cook but don’t cook your veggies or pasta yet. Just get your water boiling and have your veggies prepped. Broccoli, green beans, asparagus, peas, etc. would be a great addition to this meal either on the side as I did, or you can throw them in with the pasta.
After I put the water on the stove to start boiling, I start the chicken. To speed up the cooking time, I cut the chicken breasts in half, covered the chicken with wax paper (or you could use plastic wrap) and pounded them to an even thinness so that they would cook evenly and cook faster. Only takes a few minutes to do this, but you can skip this step. If you leave the breasts as-is you’ll have to increase your cooking time.
Instead of going through a full breading process, I just coated each chicken breast with a little flour to give them a light coating. By also not fully breading them, I can let the chicken finish cooking in the sauce as you’ll see. If you fully bread the chicken, the breading will fall off if you put the chicken in the sauce for too long.
Here’s my stack of chicken all ready to cook. This is about 2 pounds of chicken.
Heat your pan over medium-high heat, then coat the bottom of the pan with a little olive oil (or you could use vegetable or canola oil).
Once the oil is hot, cook the chicken about 2-3 minutes per side or until golden brown and crispy. Don’t worry if your chicken is not fully cooked through yet. Place the chicken on a baking sheet or dish and continue cooking the rest of the chicken in batches. Don’t overcrowd the chicken in the pan and add a little oil between batches if necessary.
When you’re done cooking all your chicken you’ll be left with all these brown bits at the bottom of the pan and maybe a little oil. Don’t worry, that’s a good thing! If you have a lot of oil left in the pan, drain it.
Add your sundried tomato butter, wine, and chicken broth to the pan and using a wooden spoon or spatula scrape the bottom of the pan as you mix everything together to get those little brown bits to release. I had a little of the sundried tomato butter around the house so thought I’d build the sauce around it. Instead of the wine, you could use a little more chicken broth or even tomato sauce.
Bring the sauce to a boil, then reduce the heat to simmer. Let the sauce reduce for about 5-10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add your herbs/spices. To make this sauce creamy you could add a little heavy cream or cream cheese. If you don’t want your sauce creamy but want it a little thicker you could add a little cornstarch/water. Then add your chicken to the sauce to finish cooking.
As your finishing your sauce and adding your chicken start to cook your pasta and vegetables. You can use any kind of pasta even whole wheat. You could even substitute cooked spaghetti squash. You want your sauce to “wait” for your pasta, and not the other way around. If your pasta finishes cooking before your sauce you’ll have mushy pasta. So always try to get your sauce JUST about ready and let it simmer while your pasta finishes.
Cook your pasta to al dente or even a little firmer. Add the pasta to your pan and cook another minute or so until the pasta is cooked through and soaks in some of that sauce. If you don’t have room in your pan for all of this, remove the chicken from the pan and put on a plate. Then mix your pasta in the pan with the sauce for a minute or two, then put the chicken on top. Top the chicken with a little cheese if you’d like.
You can add your vegetables right in with the pasta or serve on the side. I steamed some green beans to serve on the side. Quick and easy! And not to mention a lot cheaper than going to an Italian restaurant!!
Bon appetit! Hope you enjoy this Sundried Tomato Herb Chicken & Pasta!
Hope you enjoy!
Sundried Tomato Herb Chicken & Pasta
Ingredients
- 2 pounds chicken
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- Salt & Pepper to taste
- Olive oil or oil for pan
- 1/2 cup Sundried Tomato Butter
- 2 cups chicken broth or stock
- 1 cup white wine
- 2 teaspoons Italian seasoning
- 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1 pound pasta
- 2 cups shredded Italian blend cheese
- Serving suggestions: green vegetable such as green beans, asparagus, broccoli, or peas
Instructions
- Place a pot of water on the stove for your pasta, and bring to a boil. (do not cook pasta yet).
- Cut chicken breasts in half and pound to about 1/2-inch thick. Mix together flour, salt, and pepper in shallow bowl. Coat chicken lightly with flour.
- Place a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add enough oil to just coat bottom of pan. When oil is hot, cook chicken in batches, for about 2-3 minutes per side or until golden brown and crispy. Place chicken on baking sheet or plate.
- Add butter, broth/stock, and wine to pan and bring to a boil while scraping bottom of pan to release any browned bits on pan. Add Italian seasoning and garlic powder. Reduce temperature to simmer, then reduce sauce for about 5-10 minutes.
- Place chicken in pan in sauce to finish cooking. Meanwhile, cook pasta. Cook pasta al dente, drain, then mix into sauce in pan. Top chicken with cheese. Serve with desired vegetables or mix vegetables into chicken and pasta.
Notes
Sonali aka The Foodie Physician says
January 15, 2012 at 9:22 pmLooks great- yum! Love the step-by-step photos!
snappygourmet says
January 18, 2012 at 9:43 amThanks Sonali! Nice to see you blogging!:)
Jill Mant~a SaucyCook says
January 12, 2012 at 9:06 pmThis does look delish Lisa, but I need a cocktail to accompany it! You rock! Cheers!
Deb B says
January 12, 2012 at 4:46 pmThis looks fantastic. Can’t wait to try it!
Curt says
January 12, 2012 at 3:15 pmThis sounds like a delicious meal. Awesome recipe!