Super Quick Chicken Arrabbiata Recipe

While my wife is away visiting family in Japan, I've had to go back to my bachelor days of preparing quick meals for myself. As a foodie, I needed something more gourmet than a tv dinner so I'll share one of my secrets to an easy gourmet meal in just a few minutes. The key to this recipe is Trader Joe's pre-packaged and frozen pastas. You can just heat it in a saucepan and serve. By not having to boil water to cook dry and making sauce from scratch, you save lots of time. If you don't have a Trader Joes in your area, just find any frozen pasta that you like and use a single serving portion of it.

Prep/Cook Time: 15 minutes
Servings: 1 (multiply ingredients by the number of servings)

Ingredients:
1 breast from a Rotisserie Chicken (Costco)
1/2 pkg Trader Joes Arrabbiata Pasta
1/2 stalk of green onion (chopped)
1/2 bell pepper (sliced)
pecorino romano cheese to taste (Trader Joes, grated at home)
1 Tbls vegetable oil

Heat oil in a saucepan over medium heat. While waiting, slice bell peppers (cut to the size of the pasta noodles) and add to the pan. While that cooks, dice chicken breast into bite sized pieces and add to pan. Cook until chicken is completely heated through. Add frozen pasta and a few tablespoons of water. Cook until all pasta sauce is completely melted. Add more water if the sauce seems too thick. Right before plating, add half the green onions and give the pasta a stir. After plating, grate pecorino cheese and sprinkle the rest of the green onion on top as garnish.

Enjoy!

Variations:
Zucchini and/or squash cut into sticks can be added with or instead of the bell peppers. Just keep the total quantity of vegetables relatively the same. Also good is quartered artichoke hearts which you can find canned or jarred. Instead of chicken, you can try canned tuna in oil (not water). Be sure to drain the oil from the tuna. For garnish, you can use parsley or Italian flat-leaf parsley, but reduce the amount you use. In general, this is a good dish for using up any vegetables you may have.

FYI, that really is a picture of this dish.