Recipes for a Single Mom - Part 3

This is the last part of a series of recipes I’m sharing that I wrote for a single mom back in college. I met her while working at Starbucks. She was one of our semi-regular customers. She was looking to cook some healthy meals for her kids, but wasn’t sure where to start. So I offered to share a few recipes with her. Some of them were recipes I already had, and some were new ones I wrote for her.



Today, I am sharing a recipe for Arrabiata Sauce, which is a spicy tomato sauce.








The Recipe:

• ¼ cup olive oil
• 1 onion, diced
• 4 garlic cloves, minced
• ½ bunch fresh parsley, chopped
• 1 28 ounce can tomato puree
• 1 28 ounce can crushed tomatoes
• fresh basil, chopped
• fresh oregano, chopped
• salt and pepper
• 1 cup red wine
• 1 tablespoon crushed red pepper
• Spaghetti 

In a sauté pan, heat olive oil over medium heat. Add onions, garlic, and parsley and sauté until the onions turn translucent. Remove to a heavy bottom pot or Dutch oven. Add the remaining ingredients. Under low heat, let simmer covered for 6 to 8 hours, stirring occasionally. To finish sauce, puree with an immersion blender or in a conventional blender, until it is mostly smooth.

Serve with spaghetti or a pasta of your choice. This goes great with meatballs, chicken meatballs, or Italian sausage. It also makes a great sauce for lasagna.

Recipes for a Single Mom - Part 2

I like to pour the sauce in between the pieces of chicken to keep
the seasonings from washing of the chicken.

The second part of a series of recipes I’m sharing that I wrote for a single mom back in college. I met her while working at Starbucks. She was one of our semi-regular customers. She was looking to cook some healthy meals for her kids, but wasn’t sure where to start. So I offered to share a few recipes with her. Some of them were recipes I already had, and some were new ones I wrote for her.

The recipe I'm sharing today is Chicken with Lemon Butter Sauce.

The Recipe:

• 4 chicken breasts
• 1 cup dry white wine
• 1 cup chicken broth
• 1 cup butter, melted
• 1 large lemon, juiced
• 6 scallions, diced
• 4 garlic cloves, minced
• 8 red potatoes, quartered
• 4 portabella mushrooms, chopped
• salt and pepper

I added some carrots to the veggies this time. They do really well
with the cream or butter in the sauce.

In a bowl, combine wine, chicken broth, butter, lemon juice, scallions, and garlic, and whisk together. Arrange the chicken breasts, potatoes, and mushrooms in a 9 x 13 baking dish. Slowly pour in the liquid ingredients. Season with salt and pepper. Cover and bake at 400 degrees for about an hour.

Recipes for a Single Mom - Part 1

Lemon Chicken with Red Wine Tomato Sauce shown here with penne
pasta and green onions.

Back in college I worked at Starbucks. One of our semi-regular customers was a single mom looking to cook some healthy meals for her kids. She really had no idea where to start, so I offered to share a few recipes with her. Some of them were recipes I already had, and some were new ones I wrote for her. I'll be doing a series on these recipes in the next few weeks.

The first recipe I gave her was for my Chicken Florentine. You can find that recipe here.

The second recipe I gave her was for Lemon Chicken with Red Wine Tomato Sauce.


The Recipe:

• 2 chicken breasts
• 2 large lemons, juiced
• 1 tablespoon olive oil, plus a ½ teaspoon
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 4 roma tomatoes, diced
• 1 small portabella mushroom, diced
• 1 bushel fresh basil, chopped
• 1 teaspoon crushed red pepper
• 1 cup red wine
• salt and pepper
• rigatoni

Marinate the chicken in the lemon juice with salt and pepper for about thirty minutes. Remove the chicken from the lemon juice and lightly brown in a sauté pan in a ½ teaspoon of olive oil.

In a sauté pan, heat the olive oil. Add the garlic and some salt. After about 1 minute, add the tomatoes and the mushrooms, and let sauté about five minutes. Add the basil, red pepper, chicken, red wine, and salt and pepper. Cover and let cook for 10 – 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. Uncover and let cook for another five minutes, stirring once.

Remove from sauté pan and serve over rigatoni pasta.