Introducing . . .

NES!

So, I always talk about NES making me dinner or NES and I cooking and things like that.  And NES also blogs!  So what would make more sense than having NES guest blog?  We've been talking about it for a while, but it's just easier now that we're under one roof.

So here goes!

Hey everyone, it's time for something completely different. It's NES here; if you've read this blog for any length of time I'm sure you've read about me now and then. For those who don't know I'm LBMS's husband. She's asked me to do a guest blog entry, so here I am.

The recipe I'm going to be talking about tonight is super easy to make, but one of my all time favorite meals. Of course, I am a sucker for tortellini and all kinds of pepper. That might have something to do with it. So the meal started out as something I was told about. The basic idea was to put on a pot of spaghetti, then pan fry some chicken in butter and garlic with some pepper. Serve the chicken on top of the pasta. It's a meal that takes slightly longer than the amount of time required to whip up some spaghetti.

Don't get me wrong, it sounded cool and all, it just sounded like something begging to be improved. So I got to thinking, what makes everything better? Cheese! Go on, tell me one thing that isn't better with cheese? Can't do it? I thought so. So I changed the spaghetti to tortellini and made a few other minor alterations.

So here's what you'll need:

Chicken

Tortellini

Shallots

Garlic

Butter

Parmesan Cheese

Sherry

Spices

Put a pot of water on the for the tortellini and cut up the shallots, garlic and chicken. I recommend not using a press for the garlic as it tends to make the pieces too small. Saute the garlic and shallots by themselves briefly, then add the chicken. Season it however you like; I usually add black pepper, crushed red pepper and cayenne pepper. Did I mention I like pepper?

When the chicken is getting near to being done, remove it and the shallots and garlic from the pan. Try to leave any grease behind if you can. Next add some sherry to the pan (In these pictures I added red wine instead. LBMS preferred it, I still recommend sherry). Let the sherry reduce by at least half, stirring occasionally. Add everything back in and continue cooking.

Now you just wait until your tortellini is done, hopefully that will be soon since dry chicken is no fun at all. When the tortellini is ready just add it on into the pan, along with butter and parmesan cheese. Make sure you keep mixing and stirring so that the pasta doesn't burn. When it starts to brown you know it's done. You also know it's delicious.

That's all for now, make sure to check back for more awesome recipes.