Raving about Recipes

I've tried my hand at a couple more recipes. Again, I found them via the Epicurious app.

Baked Tomatoes

Ingredients (4 servings):

• 1/2 loaf Italian bread (about 8 ounces) 
• 5 to 6 sprigs flat-leaf Italian parsley 
• 1 medium clove garlic 
• 1 tablespoon capers 
• 1 teaspoon salt 
• 3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, or more as needed 
• 2 large tomatoes or 4 small ones

Recipe:
Preheat the oven to 250°F. Cut away and discard the crust from the loaf of bread and cut the loaf in half lengthwise. Bake for 5 minutes on each side. Let cool for 10 to 15 minutes.

Raise the oven temperature to 350°F on convection heat or to 375°F in an oven without convection heat.

Cut the bread into chunks small enough to fit easily in a food processor. Place them in the food processor and pulse until you have fairly even crumbs that are not too fine. Set aside 1 cup of crumbs and reserve any extra for another use.

Finely chop enough parsley leaves to measure about 2 tablespoons. Peel and finely chop the garlic. Put the parsley, garlic, bread crumbs, capers, salt, and olive oil in a mixing bowl. Mix well until the ingredients are evenly distributed and the bread crumbs are well coated with the olive oil. If there doesn't seem to be enough olive oil to coat them all, add a little more.

Cut the tomatoes in half crosswise and scoop out all the seeds. Place the tomatoes, cut side up, on a baking sheet. Fill the cavities with a generous amount of the bread-crumb mixture, heaping it on top of each tomato half.

Bake until a brown crust forms, about 20 minutes. Serve hot or at room temperature.

Thoughts:
I decided to make this recipe without capers. I don't think they were necessary, as the end result was flavorful, but I would be interested in remaking the recipe after figuring out a good replacement for capers.

I liked how these tomatoes came out. However, I think I would use somewhat larger tomatoes next time, as I don't think they were quite large enough to hold a decent amount of stuffing.

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Lemon-Herb Chicken with Roasted Potatoes

Ingredients (4 servings):

Chicken:

• Juice of 2 lemons (about 1/3 cup) 
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh basil or 2 teaspoons dried basil 
• 1 tablespoon chopped fresh oregano or 1 teaspoon dried oregano 
• 2 teaspoons chopped garlic 
• 4 boneless, skinless chicken breast halves (about 1 3/4 pounds) 
• 1 tablespoon plus 1 1/2 teaspoons olive oil

Potatoes:

• 14 ounces small red potatoes, quartered 
• 4 teaspoons olive oil 
• 1 tablespoon fresh rosemary or 1 teaspoon dried rosemary

Recipe:

Chicken:
Mix lemon juice, basil, oregano and garlic. Season chicken with salt and pepper. Heat oil over medium heat in a large skillet. Cook chicken 8 minutes; turn and cook 5 minutes more. Add lemon-juice mixture and stir up anything stuck to skillet. Reduce heat and cover; simmer until cooked through, about 6 minutes.

Potatoes:
Heat oven to 450°F. Toss all ingredients in a roasting pan and cover with foil. Cook 20 minutes. Remove foil; cook 20 minutes more, stirring once.

Thoughts:
I liked the simplicity of these recipes. The lemon added a nice, but not overpowering, flavor to the chicken.

I really liked cooking with the small red potatoes; their small size makes them a bit more convenient to work with than conventional potatoes, and they have a nice texture and flavor.

Shortly after I first made this recipe, I gave it another shot; however, I pan fried the potatoes rather than placing them in an oven for 40 minutes. It was significantly quicker, and the taste was equivalent (though perhaps the 'quick' potatoes were slightly oilier).