Day 276: Chicken with Basil Cream Sauce

Whew!  My to do list keeps getting longer and longer!  I'm glad I can finally cross today's post off it!  Its canning season at my house and I have bushels and bushels of fruit in my mudroom just waiting to be put into jars and made into jams.  I'm so glad my kids like to cook, because they've been picking up my slack!  My oldest son, Colton, made this for dinner last night.  He is really getting to be a good cook and he has really gotten the hang of the dutch ovens!  I'm one proud Mama!

Chicken with Basil Cream Sauce
10" dutch oven

1/4 cup milk
1/4 cup dry bread crumbs
4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
3 Tbs. butter or margarine
1 Tbs. olive oil
3/4 cup chicken broth, divided
1 cup heavy whipping cream
1 (4 oz.) jar diced pimentos
1/2 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
1/4 cup fresh minced basil (I used 1 1/2 Tbs. dried)
1/8 tsp. pepper
1 tsp. cornstarch

Place milk and bread crumbs in separate shallow bowls.  Dip chicken in milk, then coat with bread crumbs.  In a dutch oven over a full spread of coals, brown the chicken on both sides in butter and olive oil.  In the same pot, bake the chicken at 350° for 30-40 minutes or until juices run clear.  Use 1 ring on the top and 1 ring on the bottom.  When chicken is cooked, remove from the pot and keep warm.
In the pot the chicken was cooked in, bring 1/2 cup of broth to a boil over a full spread of coals.  Stir to loosen the browned bits from the bottom of the pot.  Stir in the cream and pimento; boil and stir for 1 minute.  Remove about 1/4 of the coals and stir in the Parmesan, basil and pepper and cook until heated through.  Mix the cornstarch and 1/4 cup chicken broth and stir into the pot to thicken the sauce if needed.  Pour sauce over chicken and serve.  Serves 4.

The Finished Product

Wow!  That's a bad picture.  It tastes a lot better than it looks!

The Review

This was really good.  I was sad that my basil plant died and I had to use dried basil.  It would have been even better, and prettier, with the fresh herb.  I was really proud of my son to try making a dish like this!  I helped him figure out how to do it in the dutch oven, but he did all the cooking.  We gave this a B+.