Honey ~ The Underutilized Ingredient

Nature’s sweetener, that’s what honey is. My feeling is that this silky, golden syrup is completely underutilized in our modern day cuisine. So my mission lately has been to come up with recipes that incorporate honey as much as possible. This is just the beginning of this venture, but so far here is what I have come up with…


Chicken & Mushrooms with a White Peach Balsamic & Honey Reduction

*note: this recipe was designed to serve 1, myself, so if serving more than 1, please feel free to adjust the recipe in any way you see fit

Ingredients:
1 – Boneless, skinless chicken cutlet (cubed)

½ lbs. – White button mushrooms, sliced

1 clove – minced garlic

1 Teaspoon – Dried thyme

1 Tablespoon – Honey

¾ - 1 cup – White Peach Balsamic Vinegar (this can be found at a specialty oil/vinegar store called Carter & Cavero Old World Olive Oil Co.)

Non-stick Cooking Spray

Salt & Pepper

Directions:
Spray non-stick sauté pan with non-stick cooking spray. On medium low heat, sauté mushrooms (add salt and pepper to help draw out the moisture in the mushrooms upon placing them in the pan). Let mushrooms sauté for about 10 minutes as mushrooms begin to get tender and brown. After 10 minutes, add the minced garlic to the pan. Adding the garlic at this point prevents it from burning. Once the garlic is added, and then add the cubed chicken and thyme. Let the garlic, thyme, and chicken cook with the mushrooms for another 5 minutes. After the chicken has been partially cooked for these 5 minutes, add the balsamic vinegar and honey to the pan. Let this combination cook and reduce down on medium high heat until a thick sauce forms, probably another 5 minutes.

To add some color to the dish I suggest serving this over mashed sweet potatoes. The sweetness of the white peach honey reduction compliments the sweet potato in the same way brown sugar and cinnamon would.

This is a quick cooking meal, with lots of flavor and simple ingredients. But of course the most important thing is that it uses honey! I am going to continue on my quest for finding and developing honey based recipes, but for now let's just take a moment to give a nod to nature's own sweetner...Oh honey, you’re such a sweet thang!