Recipe Recommendation

You know, I'm not generally a fan of lemon chicken in its Chinese takeaway form, but last weekend I was looking for something nice to cook for dinner on Sunday night so that Daniel had at least one good meal (I flatter myself) in his belly before he headed off to Palm Springs in California for a week of work at a wind farm.  I had some chicken, and a lemon (who doesn't have a lemon in their house, except Americans?) and I found this at Taste.com.  It'a Delicious recipe, if you can believe that...
http://www.taste.com.au/recipes/5474/lemon+chicken

I also happened to have fresh rosemary courtesy of the rosemary bush tree in my garden.  I'm not supposed to be able to overwinter rosemary here (too cold), but if I mulch mine it seems to make it through okay.  Has done for four winters now. Probably because it's planted near the concrete front steps and gets all the winter sun.  I like to brag about it to other gardeners....

It's a very simple recipe, and one of those ones you can do the day before so you don't have to worry about dinner two days in a row.  I didn't marinate it for as long as they say (overnight) because I simply am not that organised, but it still tasted really good and the house smelled WONDERFUL while it was in the oven.  Actually, the house smelled "wonderful" for several days afterwards, but that's got more to do with our lack of a range hood (and it being too cold yet to open windows) than it does with the dish itself.  I think an overnight marination might make it superb.

I served it with couscous, and a rocket salad drizzled with some Olio Bello rosemary and lime olive oil which I sprinkled with a little kosher salt.  I'm sorry to say we're down to the last of the olive oil.  And the chillie olive oil.  Bummer.  But I think it's safe to say we have thoroughly enjoyed every single drop of each.  Infused olive oils are still an emerging thing here, and I have yet to find a US olive oil that is worth anything - they just don't produce a lot of it in the warmer climates.

And speaking of rocket.... They call it by its "proper" name here (arugula), and until I spotted a big tub of it at the supermarket on Sunday, I could only ever get it in wee little packets, because it was sold as a herb.  Can you imagine?  Three leaves of rocket is not enough.  It's never enough!

Oh well.  I'll soon be able to plant my own, and that will taste way better than anything I could ever buy.  Our soils are quite alkaline, and the rocket (and lettuces) absolutely love it.

It's a good recipe, and I would encourage you all to give it a shot for an easy and cheap meal.

Where would we be without Delicious and Taste.com, I wonder?  Probably eating Chinese takeaway lemon chicken... or not.

Cheers!