Creamy chicken and herb fettuccine

Driving home from work tonight when I asked Jo what she would like for dinner, she replied she wasn’t sure, but then after I said I was thinking something with chicken, she muttered something about a dish I had not cooked for a long time, I knew immediately what she wanted even though she had no idea what to call it, nor had time to describe it.

The dish she was thinking about is a long time favourite for both of us, one I first saw being cooked on a television daytime show by Colette Mann, the blond girl that used to be on Prisoner, ye God’s how long ago was that? Prisoner I mean, not the daytime show!

I remember I was taken by the dish for what was in it as much as the way it looked on the plate and it looked awesome.  I had tried to write the recipe down as Colette cooked the meal on the show, but was not so successful, however I was lucky enough to find it in a woman’s magazine a little time latter in a doctors surgery and I ripped the page from the book and shoved it in my pocket.  

I still have the page, not that I need it anymore, I shopped on my way home for the ingredients and it is over two years since I cooked it last, I had everything I needed when I got home, including mushrooms which I had picked up thinking I was going to add something new to the dish, only to find on checking the ingredients list that mushrooms have always been on the list!

The hardest part of cooking this dish is the drive home from the shopping centre as the core ingredient is a BBQ'd chook, where the hard part comes, is smelling the lovely aroma of it all the way home whilst you are hanging out to rip a drumstick off and to get stuck in, Jo suffered tonight more than I though, such was her hunger!

 Creamy Chicken and herb fettuccini

Ingredients to serve 4
400g fettuccini	1 tbl spn Dijon mustard
2 tb spn EVOO	1/3 cup semi dried tomatoes, chopped
1 leek, finely sliced	½ BBQ chicken, boned and shredded
1 clove garlic, crushed	2 tbl spns oregano, chopped
300g button mushrooms, sliced	1/3 cup parsley, chopped
2 cups chicken stock	120g English spinach
1 cup thickened cream	1/3 cup grated parmesan cheese

Method

Cook pasta according to instructions

Heat oil in large pan, add leeks and garlic, sauté until softened. Add mushrooms, stock, cream, mustard, tomatoes, chicken, oregano and parsley, cook uncovered for ten minutes or until reduced by half, then add pasta to the pan and stir through sauce

Serve on a bed of spinach, with a sprinkle of parmesan cheese and hot garlic bread.

A truly yummy dish and one we have and will enjoy again from time to time, there are so many great flavours as you eat this meal, though I think the best is when you get some of the BBQ'd skin, YUM YUM!!