A hot meal for two in 25 minutes or less

I love good food, but I don't like to spend more then 25 minutes on any of the food I cook.
This meal turned out extra delicious and I actually timed myself; it took exactly 20 minutes to cook and 5 minutes for table/dish preparation.

Ready?

Well, before that, let me just add that my fridge was practically empty, but what I found was:

*a piece of purple onion
*left over roasted hatch green chilies
*a brand new pack of chicken breasts
*carrots
*green apples
*oranges
*a lemon
*pepper-jack cheese; solid brick
*I also had olive oil (in pantry)
*salt
*pepper
*and thai curry mix (not to be confused with Indian curry)

Also, I'd like to make another note:
It is my opinion that your meal is only as good as the cooking hardware you own.
A sharp knife, and a very good frying pan is a must.


Back to the meal...
This will look like a lot of steps, but it's really super quick.

01. Start heating up your frying pan. (I have a gas stove and always heat on just barely over low. Because I have a good frying pan, it heats up very well and evenly, plus, the olive oil never burns... which is just sooo important for your health.

02. While your pan is heating up collect what ever veggies you have in the fridge, and sound good together, and slice them up; in this case, I used the onion and roasted hatch peppers, because they were there.  The peppers, of course will make for a hot meal!

03. When your veggies are sliced up, carry them over to the frying pan on the cutting board, dump them in, and pour a bit of olive oil over them; stir until all is mixed and coated with the olive oil. (a little bit will do)

04. cover and move on




05. Put the chicken breast on a cutting board and pound the heck out of it until it's nice and flat

06. Sprinkle the meat with something as simple as salt and pepper, or in my case, the thai curry.  (Again, not to be mistaken for Indian curry, as it tastes nothing like it, plus it doesn't smell like Indian curry at all.)

07. Get the cheese and shred it onto the meat.

08. By the time you finish with the cheese, your veggies should be nicely sauteed.

09. Go get the veggies, move them onto the meat and spread them evenly.

10. Grab one end of the chicken breast and start rolling. (Don't worry if the flattened chicken is falling apart in places... it's okay; once it starts frying it will harden around the veggies and this will not matter)

11. Transfer to frying pan.  Cover the rolled up chicken and fry on the same frying pan you did the veggies in. Don't even worry with washing, just clean off the pan with a paper towel and add a bit of new olive oil. When the chicken gets nice and firm/white on top, flip over... the side you just fried should be nice and golden brown.  (I use organic chicken meat, which actually cooks differently then the regular antibiotic fed grocery store chicken.  Organic is also more tender and tastes better.)

12. While the chicken is frying, make the salad.
In this case, I shredded 3 carrots and one green apple, then mixed it all together (this releases the juices.) I also squeezed a bit of lemon on top when I remembered that I had it, mixed everything again and divided the mixture onto two plates. No spices necessary.

13. Since orange slices go well with what I just made, and I happened to have oranges, I sliced one up and divided it between two plates.

14. By the time you finish dressing the dishes with the salad and oranges, your chicken should be ready.










15. Put the chicken on a cutting board and cut in 1/2. Place each half onto each of the plates. Voila! You just prepared a delicious meal for two!  ...and let me just say, the purple onion caramelized and melted into the chicken meat, while the peppers added a lovely kick.  The citrus and salad added a lovely balance to the hotness of the chicken roll.  ...and lets not forget the touch of that melty cheesy goodness... It was sooo yummy!

The good thing about this recipe is that it can be modified a 100 times and it will be great each time.  Have fun with it!