Busy back-to-school season calls for easy supper time options
Staff, wire reports
In The Dominion Post’s ongoing Wednesday feature, Quarantine Kitchen, we highlight dishes prepared by readers, staffers and chefs at our local restaurants, as well as some good ones we find from the Associated Press, in an effort to keep us connected through food.
With schools back in session — in person, even! — we know parents are looking for easy options to get everyone fed after a hard day of learning, be it at home or in the classroom.
What they aren’t looking for are difficult, time-consuming recipes, or dishes that leave piles of dirty pots and pans to wash afterward.
So this week, we thought we’d share one of the best time-saving meal plans out there — a sheet pan dinner.
As it’s name implies, this meal can be cooked all on one sheet pan — yes, that’s your main dish and your sides, on a single pan.
Building a sheet-pan dinner is easy. Pick a protein, add one or two kinds of vegetables and/or a starch. If you want a quick-cooking vegetable, add it at the end while the protein is resting, as is done with the green peas in this sheet-pan version of Chicago’s Chicken Vesuvio, below.
When creating these meals, place a piece of parchment paper on the sheet pan first. It prevents food from sticking to the pan and makes cleanup even easier.
Make sure your ingredients are spread evenly in one layer. Don’t overcrowd the sheet pan, or your food will steam instead of roast and you won’t have those delicious, crunchy, caramelized edges.
Finally, choose foods that take about the same time to cook. That means using hard, dense vegetables like potatoes, hard squash, carrots and cauliflower for whole pieces of chicken, pork and beef, and smaller vegetables like asparagus, baby broccoli and sugar snap peas for seafood like salmon or shrimp, or smaller chunks of meat.
The basic tenets of roasting apply. Coat the food with a thin layer of olive oil, and season it at with kosher salt. Add other seasonings to taste.
Voila, dinner is (almost) served — all you need are some plates.
CHICAGO’S CHICKEN VESUVIO ON A SHEET PAN
- 1 whole chicken (3 to 4 pounds), broken down into breasts, wings and thigh-leg pieces (leaving thighs and legs attached), or 4-6 bone-in chicken breasts and thighs
- Extra-virgin olive oil
- Kosher salt
- 2 teaspoons dried Italian seasoning
- Freshly ground white pepper
- 2-3 lemons, cut in half
- 3-4 pounds russet potatoes, cleaned and cut into wedges
- 8-12 cloves garlic, peeled
- Fresh oregano, divided
- 2 large shallots, chopped
- 1/2 cup dry white wine
- 4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, plus more if you want the sauce richer
- 1 cup frozen peas, thawed
Place the chicken pieces in a large re-closeable bag. Pour olive oil over them and massage to coat.
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Line a sheet pan with parchment paper.
Set the chicken on the sheet pan. Season both sides of the pieces generously with the Italian seasoning and salt and pepper. Add the cut lemons to the pan. Make sure you have one half lemon for each piece of chicken.
Place the potato wedges and garlic cloves in another re-closeable plastic bag and add olive oil. Massage to coat evenly. Season potato wedges generously with the Italian seasoning and salt and pepper. Place the potatoes and the garlic on the sheet pan, spread evenly apart in one layer. Sprinkle all over with half of the fresh oregano.
Roast until the chicken and potatoes are cooked through, 50-60 minutes, depending on the size of the chicken pieces. Test the chicken using an instant-read meat thermometer; it should be 160 degrees for the white meat and 180 degrees for the dark meat. If the chicken and potatoes are cooked through but not brown enough, let them sit under the broiler for 5 minutes. Remove from oven and let chicken and potatoes rest on the sheet pan. Pick up two of the roasted halved lemons and, while they are still hot, squeeze them over the chicken and the potatoes. Scatter the fresh oregano all over. Let chicken rest for 10 minutes.
Meanwhile, in a small saucepan or 10-inch skillet, melt the butter and saute the shallot for about 3 minutes or until the butter foams and begins to brown. Add the wine to the skillet and turn up the heat for 1 minute to deglaze the pan. Add the roasted cloves of garlic to the pan and smoosh them with a fork. Stir well. Reduce the heat and add the peas. Let simmer about 2 minutes or until the peas are warmed through. Taste the sauce for seasoning. If you want it to be richer, add the rest of the stick of butter. Make sure you add enough salt because this sauce will be what flavors the chicken. Pour the hot sauce over the chicken.
Serve immediately with the potatoes and a roasted lemon wedge. Squeeze more lemon over chicken and potatoes if desired.
