Cobb Salad

We stayed at a DoubleTree Hotel when we traveled to Burlington a few months ago. Not only do they present you with warm chocolate chip cookies upon checking in, but their room service menu is surprisingly awesome.

I had ordered a cobb salad and was anticipating a ho-hum dining experience. I suppose a cobb salad is a tough thing to mess up, but this salad was so good that I recreated it as soon as we returned home.



I have been buying local chicken from our co-op and have figured out a cooking method that works perfectly, though I certainly did not invent this method! I confess, too, to buying skin-on chicken breasts because, well, skin tastes good. In my oven-safe grill pan, I sear the salted and peppered chicken skin-side down until it is nice and brown. I flip it over and pop it into a 375 degree oven with a probe thermometer set to alarm me when the internal temperature reaches about 170 degrees. The result is simple perfection!

Toss this chicken with some kind of greens, tomatoes, bacon, hard-boiled egg, avocado, roquefort cheese and vinaigrette. it's a new dinner staple in our home.

Fettuccine with Creamy Red Pepper Sauce

Another of Ellie Krieger's smart, easy recipes, I made fettuccine with creamy red pepper sauce a few weeks ago. I have a recent obsession with this goat cheese, though, and substituted it for the feta she calls for. It made for a creamy sauce, but lacked the saltiness that the feta would have imparted. Next time, feta!



I used a new whole-wheat pasta in this recipe—Bionaturae brand—and it was particularly tasty with a great texture.