Sunday Dinner




Grilled Chicken, Grilled Zucchini and Bruschetta

 We decided to make Sunday lunch at home this week, instead of eating a sandwich or grabbing fast food like we usually do after church.  If you need a yummy meal to serve guests or just for a family night at home, this is the meal!  It was fresh and so yummy!!

I pulled out a 3 lb. bag of boneless, skinless chicken breasts and marinated it using this recipe.  It was really delicious, even though it's so simple.  I didn't get it mixed up very early, so it only marinated about an hour and it was still great!  Next time I'll let it marinate overnight.  To make it easy on you, here's the recipe:

Basil Marinade for Grilled Chicken

1 Tbsp. olive oil

1 Tbsp. red wine vinegar (I didn't have any; I used apple cider vinegar)

1 Tbsp. chopped fresh basil

1 Tbsp. finely chopped red onion

2 tsp. kosher salt

1 tsp. whole black peppercorns (I used 1 tsp. coarse ground pepper)

1 clove garlic, minced

4 boneless skinless chicken breasts

Mix marinade ingredients in a gallon-size ziploc bag.  Add chicken breasts and seal bag.  Toss to coat chicken and marinate in refrigerator for 3-12 hours.  Grill or cook chicken as desired.

I doubled this recipe to cover all my chicken (since I had 3 lbs.)  I also used closer to 1/2 cup of basil and about 4 cloves of garlic.  Because really, how can it not benefit from more basil and garlic?  ; )

For a super simple side dish (say that 10x fast!) I sliced a  g i a n t  farmer's market zucchini in quarters lengthwise.  I laid them out on a plate, then brushed each side with olive oil and sprinkled with kosher salt and fresh cracked pepper.  Sweet Hubby put them on the grill for about 20 minutes, to get nice grill marks.  They were crisp-tender and I think they could have cooked another 10-15 minutes, but we were starving!  They were still delicious!

To round out the meal, I also toasted some thin slices of French bread, chopped tomatoes and basil and we had make-your-own-bruschetta.  I posted that "recipe" last summer (but it's also really easy!)  For dessert, we had brownies I had made on Friday and dips of vanilla ice cream, you know to balance out all that healthy stuff.  : )

I was absolutely stuffed to the gills after that delicious meal!  I even told Sweet Hubby that it's the best meal I've had in awhile.  Of course, the dinner would be nothing without the fabulous company of my family...what a lovely Sunday!