Friday, February 29, 2008

Gnocchi with chicken, pesto, and mozzarella

This was actually last night's dinner. I just can't seem to get back in the swing of posting every day, but I pinky swear I'm trying to! The weather here has been awesome lately, so the boy wants to be outside all the time. And he wants mommy outside playing with him, so most of my time (except when he's napping) has been spent hanging out on my patio. Not that I mind, I'm just not getting a whole lot done! Oh well, he's only young once and he's not always going to want me around, so I should enjoy it while I can.

We were originally going to have this on Wednesday night, but we ended up having tacos instead. I didn't post the recipe because everyone knows how to make tacos. My friend Jen B. had told me about gnocchi at Trader Joe's, so I got some last time I was there. I'd only had them in a frozen entree thing from TJ's before, so I was interested in trying them with something different. I was quite pleased with the result! I cooked two chicken breasts on my grill pan, cut up eight ounces of mozzarella into small pieces, cooked the gnocchi per the pacakge directions (boil water, add gnocchi, wait until they float to the top of the water), and I made some pesto. I tossed it all together, and VOILA! Dinner was served. Since the rest of it wasn't anything difficult or requiring a recipe, here's my low-fat pesto recipe. I found it online last summer when I had a ton of basil to use up (don't you just love fresh basil?! I could sit and smell it all day long...if I wasn't spending my days sitting on my patio. Maybe I should take some basil outside with me to sit and smell...). I love pesto but the usual version is rather unhealthy because of all the oil. This one is super easy to do and low fat!

Low Fat Pesto Sauce
2/3 cup chicken or vegetable stock
2 cloves garlic
1 cup fresh basil
1/3 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
2 tablespoons pine nuts

Combine stock and garlic and heat in the microwave on high for 5 minutes (or heat on the stove). Allow to cool. Chop basil in food processor. Add cooled stock, Parmesan cheese and pine nuts. Whirl until everything is finely chopped and blended.

*****

I didn't end up having pine nuts last night, so I used macadamia nuts instead. It was that, pecans, or walnuts, and I figured macadamia nuts were closer than pecans or walnuts. It turned out really good! And I got to use my new microplane to grate the parmesan!! Jen B. and I skipped out on photography class Wednesday night and went to Sur La Table and AJ's, our fancy schmancy grocery store here in Phoenix. I've been wanting a microplane for SO LONG, so I finally got one Wednesday night.

I heart Sur La Table. I wish I had endless amounts of disposable income so I could do some real damage in that store.

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