Last night I hosted a little dinner party featuring Mom’s Chicken Normandy.

I’m not gonna lie: it wasn’t the most graceful hosting gig I’ve done, which was a little blow to my ego. I consider myself pretty savvy when it comes to dinner parties; however, it was my first time hosting one after work which I’ve decided is a no-no from now on unless I’m serving something simple like spaghetti or a big salad. I didn’t give myself enough time in between getting home from work and our friends arriving. The first batch of sauce I made was crap so I had to start again from scratch. I didn’t have an adequate number of beer or water glasses. Usually I like to have a little smorgasbord of cured meats, cheeses, grapes, and olives set out for guests to nibble on. I also like having a pitcher of pre-filtered Brita water + 1 fresh squeezed lemon chilling in the fridge to place on the table. None were executed last night so I was slightly flustered as I scrambled to finish up the sauce when the doorbell rang. Fortunately, though, once that sauce is hugging the chicken and apples in the baking dish all you have to do is sit back with a glass of wine (or beer or cider — see below) while the savory aroma of chicken and apples baking in white wine, cream, butter, onions, and garlic fills your nose.

Ingredients:

• 6 tbs butter
• 2-3 lbs boneless chicken things or breasts
• 3-4 Golden Delicious Apples
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 small chopped yellow or white onion
• 2 tbs Wondra
• 1 cup heavy cream or half and half
• 2 tbs Grey Poupon mustard
• 1/4 cup dry white wine
• 1 tbs lemon juice
• 1/2 tsp salt
• Dash of white pepper
• Chopped parsley

Instructions:

• Melt 4 tbs butter in skillet
• Add garlic, onion, and chicken
• Brown chicken on all sides, remove chicken only to shallow baking dish
• Wash and cut apples into wedges (leave peel on!)
• Add apples to skillet and brown lightly
• Add chicken only to baking dish
• Melt remaining 2 tbs butter in small saucepan
• Blend in Wondra
• While stirring constantly, add cream and cook until thickened
• Blend in mustard, wine, lemon juice, salt and pepper
• Pour over chicken and apples
• Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes
• Sprinkle with chopped parsley before serving

Makes 4 servings:

Chicken Normandy served on a bed of steamed Trader Joes 3-minute Organic Brown Rice

Since Shrek and I were doing the chef-ing, I requested that our dinner guests take care of the drinks. They were so great about inquiring what we were making ahead of time and then thoughtfully paired our dish with some ales, draft cider, and a lovely bottle of white wine that I’ve added to my Wine List. Note to self: I need a little schooling in Wine 101. For all the tastings I’ve done, I’m great at determining whether I like a vintage or not, but clueless about, well, here’s a prime example: I completely missed that the guys were simply letting the bottle of white breathe when they uncorked it because I came along, poured a few glasses, and re-corked it. Doh.

At least I can always count on my cookies. And good company to make the evening enjoyable!

Clockwise from left: Zebra Cookies, Lemon Almond Biscotti, Raspberry Jam Thumbprint Cookies