Recipe: Chicken With Mushrooms, and Pasta With Basil

[serenissima]

This was dinner Saturday night.

Ingredients
For the chicken: 1 to 1.5 pounds of chicken cutlets or chicken tenders a carton of fresh baby portabella mushrooms -- I don't know how much this is. 10 ounces maybe. 1 can of chicken broth 4 or 5 cloves of garlic 1 cup of flour about 1/2 teaspoon of salt, to taste 1/2 to 1 teaspoon of ground black pepper, to taste	For the pasta: about 2/3 of a pound dry pasta. Rotelle, penne or macaroni work well a bunch of fresh basil a carton of fresh cherry tomatoes or grape tomatoes -- perhaps a pound? 3 shallots, or one small onion salt to taste
Preparation and Cooking
Peel and mince the garlic, and divide it into three roughly equal amounts. Chop the mushrooms if they are not pre-sliced. Mix the salt and pepper with the flour. Using a bowl or plastic bag, according to your preferred method, coat the pieces of chicken with this mixture. Only a little will stick: you're going for a dusting of flour, not batter. Reserve the remaining flour for now. Heat a small amount of oil in a pan. When warm, scatter one of the three portions of minced garlic in it. Place the chicken on top of the garlic and pan-fry until cooked through. Set it aside. Saute the mushrooms with the second portion of garlic. When cooked, add the chicken broth. Add five or six tablespoons of the seasoned flour, one at a time, stirring well with each, until the sauce reaches the desired consistency. It should become opaque but not thick. The rest of the flour may be discarded. Put the chicken in the serving dish and the mushroom sauce on top. If the serving dish is deep but not very broad, you may want to do this in two layers.	Cook the pasta until "al dente" according to package directions. Drain and set aside when cooked. Chop the shallots. Wash the tomatoes and slice them in half. Wash the basil and pick the leaves from the stems. Cut tender portions of the stems into bite-size pieces, if desired, and discard the rest of the stems. Saute the tomatoes and shallots together with the third portion of minced garlic and a pinch or two of salt, until the tomatoes begin to soften. Add the cooked pasta and the basil and toss together in the pan until the basil wilts, maybe one minute. Serve, topped with a sprinkle of parmesan cheese if desired.

I think the mushroom sauce would be good with a little white wine mixed in, but I've never attempted it.