Yummy Dinner of Broccoli Patties, Chicken and Homemade Bread!

FIrst of all, I want to say that dinner pictured here, is in a bowl.  That is not a dinner plate completely filled with saucy chicken to the rim.  It's a soup/cereal bowl.  This dinner was sooooo gooood.  I didn't plan it to be this good; I was going to serve the saucy chicken over pasta and just serve the broccoli patties with it.  But the hubs reminded me that I had made a loaf of whole wheat bread yesterday and that we should have a slice of that instead of the pasta.  Good call, hubs!

I found this fabulous recipe for Broccoli Bites For Kids on Pinterest a month or so ago and decided to try it today.  Easy to make and a hit with all 3 of us.  I cut the recipe in third and made 4 patties for us.  The loaf of bread is The Master Recipe from Healthy Bread in Five Minutes a Day, the sequel to Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day which got me not only baking bread but loving it.  So simple!

The chicken I just made up with what was in the house and needed to be used up.  I sautéed half a sweet onion, half a red pepper, a small shallot, 2 cloves of garlic and some "use or lose" mushrooms in equal parts butter and oil for about 15 minutes.  BTW, you can make this with whatever veggies you have on hand/you like or no veggies at all!  I removed them from the pan to a bowl.  I chopped up 2 chicken breasts, sprinkled them with salt and pepper, cooked them in the same pan then put them in the bowl with the veggies.  I added 1/2 tbsp of butter to the pan and, after it melted, added approx 1.5 tbsp flour.  Whisked that around together for a couple of minutes to burn off the "floury" taste and added chicken stock.  Continued to whisk until it thickened somewhat and then added a splash or two of half & half (I had no heavy cream.  You could also use whatever milk you have in the house or just use the chicken stock.)  Once everything was the thickness I wanted, I seasoned with a little more salt & pepper, turned off the flame, added the veggies and chicken to the sauce, married all those beautiful flavors together and ladled it into a bowl.  Finally I added a broccoli patty and half a slice of buttered, homemade, whole wheat bread and then moaned through the whole meal!