My husband and I have an "At Home Date Night" every second week. We feed our boys dinner, get them off to bed and enjoy our own meal, some wine, possibly a movie and always lots of uninterrupted kid-free conversation, later in the evening. It's nice, often romantic and something we both look forward to.
When the boys were younger we would take turns alternating who would plan the date and the organizer would be responsible for picking up the wine and planning/preparing the menu for the evening. Now that our nights are fuller with extra-curricular activities, we try to cook one thing that we can use for both the boy's early dinner and our later date night dinner. One-time cook for two different meals.
The last time we did this we made grilled apricot chicken. Nothing more than a mix of apricot preserves and olive oil smeared over chicken breasts and placed on the bbq for some quick grilling. Once cooked, we sliced a few breasts and placed them on a tortilla shell spread with the jam. We added some baby spinach, grated sharp cheddar cheese and placed everything in my beloved panini press and dinner for the boys was ready in ten minutes. Our chicken was wrapped until later when we placed it, sliced, on a bed of baby spinach and topped it with honeyed-peaches, navy beans, pistachios and goat cheese. So delicious, and oh so easy.
I'll try to post more of these two for one meals as we make them. Even if you don't use the second meal as a date-night dinner, it's great to cook only once in order to eat twice. Do any of you do that already? What are your tips for making more than one meal with a one-time cook? Please do share and I'll gather the ideas and place them all in a future post. Have a great day....
Apricot Grilled Chicken
1/2 cup apricot preserves
3 tbsp olive oil
salt and pepper
6 chicken breasts, washed and patted dry
~ Combine the preserves and olive oil in a small mixing bowl.
~ Sprinkle the chicken breasts with some salt and pepper on each side.
~ Smear both sides of the breasts with the preserves mixture.
~ Grill or bake as usual.
~ Enjoy!
