Lemon Chicken

While searching for a new and exciting (or at least different) recipe for chicken last night, I stumbled upon Lemon Chicken in Craig Claiborne's cookbook. I changed the sauce somewhat, because my husband won't eat any meat (except steak) without sauce or gravy, I followed the recipe "pretty much". The recipe calls for the meat to be browned in a pan, then covered and simmered for 15 to 20 minutes, but I don't do pan meat - too much work.

LEMON CHICKEN

3 lbs. chicken
2 tbsp oil
1/2 cup chopped scallions
1 tbsp parsley
1/4 cup lemon juice
1/2 tsp marjoram
salt and pepper to taste

Brown the chicken in oil over high heat for a few minutes. Lower the heat, add scallions and lemon juice, cover and simmer for 15 to 20 minutes. Stir in parsley and marjoram and serve.

What I did:

Cut the chicken into thin (1/4" thick) slices. Replace the oil with 1 stick butter. Melt butter in broiler pan; place chicken in pan and flip to coat in butter, sprinkle with salt and pepper, and broil for 6 to 7 minutes on each side. After the first broiling, pour most of the pan juices into a sauce pan. Add 1 cup cream to pan juices. Whisk 1/4 cup flour in with 1/2 cup water, then whisk into the cream/pan juice mix. Add scallions and marjoram, and cook until thickened. Just before it's finished, add the parsley. Pour the remainder of the chicken pan juices into the sauce pan, whisk together, add salt & pepper to taste, then pour about half back over the chicken. Put the remainder in a gravy boat, and serve with white rice.

This was too tart. Next time, I'd cut the lemon juice to 2 tbsp. Other than that, this was a good Monday night experiment.

Note for Lori: I use sea salt or kosher salt in place of regular table salt. It has at least 1/4 less sodium, and is less "salty". I've noticed that you aren't a big fan of salt, nor am I. Michael was a salt fanatic when I met him, but he's learned the joys of other seasonings, and now is quite happy with very little salt.