ROASTED CHICKEN DINNER

Sorry I haven't been posting that much, last week was a bastard. What a way to wind down a crappy week-roasted chicken and clean out the pantry/fridge dinner!

I have been cooking for a client this week and some of the leftover ingredients made their way into this meal. I had half of a head of cauliflower, a tiny butternut squash, some forbidden rice, half a cup of farro and some cherry tomatoes.

I really did not feel like making a whole chicken, so I picked up some breasts with the bones and skin, popped them in a sauté pan, drizzled with olive oil, roasted at 400 degrees for about 40 minutes. Fifteen minutes before the chicken was done, I added some halved cherry tomatoes, a few whole cloves of garlic and some sage leaves. While that was cooking, I diced the squash and roasted it on the same tray as the cauliflower, checking it every few minutes because the squash didn't need to cook as long.

Forbidden rice has a deep purple almost black color and slightly nutty flavor. It cooks just like regular rice, so when that was done, I folded it into some cooked farro. To that mix, I added the roasted squash and drizzled that with some olive oil and sage leaves.

There you have it, roasted chicken breasts with tomatoes and sage, forbidden rice and farro with butternut squash and roasted cauliflower. I know, it is a weird mix of seasons with the winter squash and the summery tomatoes. It went surprising well and made me happy.