Amateur Mother: Empty Fridge = Creative Dinner

Sometimes I stare into my fridge and all that looks back at me is an empty white void. Today was one of those days....
I took out a couple of chicken breasts from the freezer earlier in the day and hoped that sometime throughout the afternoon some wonderful idea would spring into my mind... Well, I was wrong.
Later in the afternoon though my Mom stopped by and as I was staring longingly at my chicken she said, "what about chicken with herbs? and you have that tzatziki there too?"... Thanks Mom!! An idea is born!

Here is what I am calling 'Herb Smashed Chicken'

I went out to the garden and picked some oregano, rosemary, thyme and basil. I chopped them up with some garlic, mixed with olive oil and muddled it all together. I then pounded the chicken breasts flat and rubbed the mixture all over the chicken. I then heated up my pan to about medium heat and slapped them in. They took only about 4 minutes on each side until they were a light golden brown. I served them up with tzatziki sauce for dipping and the girls and I had ourselves some yummy chicken! Although I think Kayleigh maybe ate more sauce than chicken....

Chicken with garden fresh veggies, zucchini sticks (see next) and tzatziki.

I also happened to pick a large zucchini from the garden today, and much like my experience with the fridge, found myself staring at it with nothing but blank thoughts coming back. Then I remembered in my empty fridge I actually had a little left over parmesan from another batch of kale salad we had the other night.( http://kristin-amateurmother.blogspot.com/2011/07/all-hail-kale.html scroll to bottom for salad recipe.... mucho yummy!) And my motto of course is 'cheese goes with everything!', so I sliced up the zucchini into wedges, tossed some bread crumbs on top, put a couple small dollops of butter around, then sprinkled the parm on top and baked at convect 375 for about 25 minutes. They kind of turned out like not deep fried zucchini sticks and were so good, I will definitely make those again!!

Zucchini and chicken before cooking

So my uninspired night turned into a garden inspired dinner. Without my little garden I would have had no herbs, no tomato and no zucchini.... All I would of had is an empty fridge! I love that having fresh veggies teaches me new ideas and in turn our family breaks out from the norm. Another great reason to grow your own veggies I say!