Soup's On! Zucchini Chicken with Blue Cheese

It is the season of zucchini...tons of it. Lucky us! What more versatile vegetable? Good in cake, good in bread, good in soup. Here's a recipe that we sampled tonight...good and filling. 


Take 1 medium onion and chop into rough dice. Melt 2T butter in a pan and add the onion with 1t. olive oil. Cook until soft. Cut one large zucchini lengthwise, remove seeds, and roughly dice. Add 2t. of dried oregano and the zucchini to the onion and cook. After about 2 minutes, add 6 c. chicken broth. Let simmer until the zucchini is very soft. Add salt and pepper to taste. 


Carefully put the soup, a bit at a time, into a blender to make it smooth. Put the soup back into a pan and add 3 chicken breasts (already cooked) roughly diced, to the soup. Heat the soup to the desired temperature for serving.


After putting into a soup bowl, add a couple of teaspoons of blue cheese crumbles. The cheese will melt into the hot soup and make the flavor even richer.


Enjoy!

Chicken Breasts in Irish Cream

The weather cooled a bit and it was rainy out--what more perfect time to have some good Irish food?

After some debate, I came upon chicken breasts in Irish cream. The ingredients are wonderfully simple, but when put together...wow!

I thawed four chicken breasts, put them between two sheets of waxed paper, and flattened them. On went some salt and pepper, and then I put them into a skillet set on medium-high (not too hot)  that contained a couple of tablespoons of melted butter and 3 or four coarsely chopped green onions. The chicken breasts don't take long to cook--keep an eye on them. Once they are cooked through and browned a bit, remove them from the pan, add 2 T. of whisky and deglaze (remove the brown that is stuck to the bottom of the pan). Once this is done, add 1 t. of tarragon leaves (what a great aroma!) along with 1/2-3/4 c. whipping cream. Stir and let this bubble. Once it is at a creamy consistency and all blended, then lay the chicken breasts back into the creamy mixture.

To accompany, we had mashed potatoes and carrots coated with tarragon butter. Earlier in the day I fixed some soda bread, so a small knob of Irish butter soaked in nicely on the warm bread. A bit of chardonnay and we were in for a cozy, rainy evening. Cheers!