Lemon chicken with cherry tomatoes, and cider vinegar chicken with bacon and cherry tomatoes

 

Right now we're in the mode where I never bring out a bowl quite big enough to pick all the cherry and pear tomatoes. For some reason I always think there won't be that many that will have ripened in the space of the day, and that surely we're near the end of the season. Not quite yet.

In the meantime, here are two takes on chicken that make good use of all those cheery cherry tomatoes.

Lemon chicken with burst cherry tomato sauce
Adapted from “Half Baked Harvest Super Simple” by Tieghan Gerard

Ingredients
1½ pounds boneless skinless chicken breasts
3 tablespoons olive oil, divided
1½ lemons, divided
⅜ cup flour
3 tablespoons butter
3 cups cherry tomatoes
4 garlic cloves, smashed
2 tablespoons fresh thyme leaves
Crushed red pepper flakes
½ cup white wine
1 large handful fresh basil leaves, roughly torn

Method
Zest and juice one lemon. Rub 1 tablespoon of olive oil and lemon zest over the chicken. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Sprinkle chicken evenly with flour.

In a large skillet, heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil over medium high heat. When the oil is hot, add chicken and brown on both sides until golden. Remove chicken from pan and set aside.

Cut the remaining lemon half into slices. Add butter to the skillet. When melted, add lemon slices and cook until caramelized, about 30 seconds a side. Remove lemon slices and reserve.

Add tomatoes, garlic, thyme leaves and a pinch each of salt, pepper and crushed red pepper flakes. Cook until the tomatoes begin to burst about 5 minutes or so.

Reduce heat to medium low and add white wine and lemon juice to deglaze the pan. Return chicken to the pan. Cook until the chicken is cooked through and tomatoes have formed a sauce. Serve topped with lemon slices and basil leaves.

Rating: Tasty, very tasty. While technically breaded, the main way the flour seems to come into play is by helping the sauce thicken a bit. We used some lemon thyme leaves and lemon basil as part of the herb mixture, which probably also didn't hurt. Definitely would make this again. 

 

 

Cider chicken with bacon and tomatoes
Adapted from Meredith Deeds as published in the Star Tribune Taste section.
Note: It calls for apple cider vinegar, but while reaching for that in the cupboard I realized I was reaching past some really excellent maple vinegar and grabbed that instead. I suspect the optimal vinegar choice for this recipe is whatever the best vinegar is you have in the house. I tried it again a few weeks later with a good tarragon wine vinegar and liked that as well.

Ingredients
Four bone-in chicken thighs
½ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon pepper
2 teaspoons olive oil
3 slices bacon, chopped
1 cup chopped red onion
3 cloves garlic, chopped
⅓ cup apple cider vinegar 
1 cup cherry tomatoes
2 tablespoons chopped fresh tarragon (or parsley, if you prefer)

Method
Pat the chicken dry and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Heat oil over medium high heat in a large, deep skillet.Add chicken and cook, undisturbed, until well browned. Flip over and brown the other side. (Make sure you get a really good browning at this stage because when you cover it and braise it later, you start to lose a bit of the golden color.) Remove chicken from pan and drain any excess fat. 

Add bacon to pan and cook over medium heat until it starts to render its fat. Reduce heat to medium low. Add onion and garlic and cook until softened. Stir in the vinegar. Return chicken to the pan and add tomatoes. Cover and cook until chicken is cooked through and tomatoes have burst, about 25 minutes. Serve topped with tarragon.

Rating: This is one of those recipes that was so good the first time I made it that I tried it again a few weeks later. Yep, still mighty tasty.