All the business in a bowl

All the business in a bowl

• 6.18.2011

Sometimes without much planning a nice meal comes together. Normally when I invite people over for dinner, I have something in mind. But on Friday, I had nothing in mind and I invited our dinner guests over on Monday... yes, a full 5 days in advance.

After a little brainstorming, I knew I wanted goat cheese and grilled chicken but not together. I ended up making Lemon Chicken and French Bean Salad, but with a little pizazz of course :)

Its difficult to cook on Fridays sometimes because all I want to do is curl up on the couch, put my hand in a bag of pretzels, and drink water through a bendy straw. That sounds pretty pathetic, but I'm being honest .... and its accurate. The recipe I found called for a 2 hr marinating time - who has time for that? Not me, at least not when I'm planning at the last minute. So instead I just like doubled the amount of herby goodness that it called for... that's that same as marinating for less time right?

If you look closely, you can see the "hunks" of garlic just hanging out on the chicken. I call that DELICIOUS.

oregano, rosemary, lemon ... on chicken. light and delish.

Don't pretend to be surprised. I love cous cous.

french cut beans {freezer bag style}, goat cheese, lemon juice, and olives

This meal came together really quickly too. I know because I didn't leave for the grocery store until 5pm and I had to get Baby Sister at the train station at 6:33 pm. In that time window, I grocery shopped and did all the work except grill the chicken. Impressive? Oh, and that includes getting pits out of the olives before putting them in the salad.... which by the way is a bitch.

Shopping List {served 5 with a wee bit of leftovers}

freezer bag of french green beans

goat cheese

olives

2 lemons

fresh oregano

fresh rosemary

olive oil

salt / pepper {of course}

chicken boobs {obviously}

For the chicken. 

2 tbsp. lemon zest
1/3 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice

3 cloves garlic, crushed
3 tsp. fresh thyme leaves
2 tsp. fresh rosemary leaves, finely minced

1 T of olive oil {this is approximate, essentially enough to get all the herby goodness over the chicken}
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. black pepper

 Throw all the ingredients in a bag with the chicken and marinate for 2 hours. Then toss those babies on the grill. 

For the bean business.

French Cut beans
Like a dozen-ish black olives
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 lemon
salt
fresh cracked black pepper
goat's cheese

Again. Put all this business in a bowl. Then eat it. 

The dinner was a hit and as you can see I got rid of that flowered table cloth and threw a few candles for ambiance - yep, I'm fancy.