Name: Chicken and Noodles
Prep time: 15 min
Cook time: 45 min
Ingredients: 12 ounces whole wheat egg noodles or other short pasta; 2/3 pound chicken (breasts or thighs); 1 large onion; 2 stalks celery; 1 clove garlic; 2 large or 4 small carrots; 2 tablespoons flour; 2 tablespoons butter; 2 tablespoons olive oil (plus one drizzle); zest of 1 lemon; 1/2 cup fresh parsley leaves; 1/2 teaspoon plus more seasoning salt

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Happy Monday!

Jay has his boss in town this week and then he'll be away for the second half of the week and I have 3 assignments due in class tonight and an exam on Wednesday so....

I made us comfort food. YES. I. DID. It was a necessity. We had a great weekend, but a BUSY one, so when I had a few minutes I made a big pot of these noodles with chicken so we'd have it all week for lunches and dinners when we aren't together. Plate of food

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It's basically like chicken noodle soup with gravy instead of soup. I KNOW. You're welcome. We love it, and I hop you will too! I got the idea from this recipe from Ree, who you know I love, and I made it different based on 1. not looking at the real recipe and 2. being in a hurry. Try this one soon - it's a perfect eat-out-of-the-pot-for-several-days dish.

You need chicken, onion, celery, carrot, garlic, lemon, egg noodles (or whatever, but I really like these whole wheat egg noodles!), seasoning salt, parsley, and flour. It's worth noting here that you could use a rotisserie chicken or other pre-cooked chicken. In that case, you'll also need 4 or so cups of chicken stock. Here we make our own stock when we poach the chicken, and use that to make the gravy. You also need olive oil and/or butter.

So, in this recipe there are several steps. They're all simple, but I find that doing several things at once makes the dish come together faster. I start the onion, then I cook the chicken while that's happening. Once the chicken is cooked I use the same pot to boil and drain the noodles, then in the SAME POT still, I make the gravy with the veggies. You could cook the noodles in a third pot to save even more time, but I only wanted to use two dishes. So, there.

We'll start with the onion since caramelizing it takes the longest. Thinly slice it.

The, add it to a pan over medium-low heat with a drizzle of oil and a sprinkle of seasoning salt. I added some crushed red pepper too because I wanted to. That's optional.

The onions will really slowly cook while everything else happens. We want them to get soft and golden, which can take an hour or so. I didn't have that kind of patience, so I let mine get golden-ish for 45 minutes and then moved on with my life. These are my onions about halfway through.

While the onion is working, start the chicken! You can poach frozen chicken, FYI - no need to thaw it! To poach chicken, add it to a large pot (the same one you'll use to boil the noodles) and cover it with 3 - 5 cups of water. Enough to almost cover the chicken. I added some of the

While the chicken is poaching, give the onions a stir and get to work on the other veggies. Cut the carrots into planks.

Then cut the carrot planks into sticks, then chop them into little bits. Cute!

Finely chop the celery by cutting each stalk into thin strips, then chopping them. Cut the leaves up too - they taste great!

Mince the garlic, too. Then you're done with prep!

Now, after 15 - 20 minutes check on the chicken. If it's cooked through, remove it to a plate to cool. Strain the stock (I use a small colander set over a large bowl) and set it aside.

Then, fill the same pot with water, bring it to a boil with some salt, and boil the pasta to al dente according to the package directions. While the pasta is working, shred the chicken with your fingers or two forks.

Then, drain the pasta!

Now we're ready to start our gravy and veggies. To the SAME POT (again, you could use more than one to speed things up), add some butter and/or olive oil over medium heat. ¼ cup of fat or so total. It sounds like a lot, but we're making a dish that will feed 6 or more people. So, don't freak out.

Then, add the carrots and let them cook for 2 minutes - look at that sizzle! Turn your heat up if the carrots don't sizzle when you add them to the pan.

Then, add the celery and cook the veggies together for 2 minutes more.

Now, zest the lemon directly into the pot and add the garlic with ½ teaspoon of seasoning salt. Stir everything together.

Gravy time! Sprinkle the flour over the veggies and stir for a minute or two for the flour to cook a bit and get completely coated in the fat.

Then, add 2 cups of stock and stir, adding more stock as needed to form a thin gravy. I used 3 cups total in this step, then added some more stock after I added the noodles to create more sauce.

Now, let's assemble everything. Pour the noodles back into the sauce.

And add the chicken and onions, which should be super duper soft by this point.

Stir everything together, and taste! Add more salt if you'd like, or seasoning salt, or stock to form more gravy.

That's it, guys! I'm REALLY loving this dish. Serve it topped with parsley. If you're into more of the soupy parts, you can use a bowl....

...or if you're slightly more modest, a big spoonful of this on a plate is lovely. Plate of food

Enjoy this, friends! The lemon zest and garlic add tons of flavor, and the whole wheat noodles don't get too soft in the gravy like white noodles would. I just decided which leftovers I'm eating for lunch tomorrow....

Shared with my Weekend Potluck gals.

Chicken and Noodles

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