Chicken Bacon Ranch Pasta

I love cooking. Well, actually I love cooking when I want to cook. And I don't always want to cook. My husband doesn't help either, he wants me to be relaxed and have as stress-free a day as I can. All I do is clean and do laundry anymore since I haven't reopened my shop back up yet, just sorting some things out and getting organized before I do. So he tells me to do my cleaning and play Borderlands 2 til he gets home most of the time, I have a pretty easy life so the least I can do for him is cook awesome meals. Growing up I never understood what went into making a meal, all I knew was that it showed up on my plate at dinnertime. As I got older, went to college, and struck out on my own, I could never see myself as the quintessential housewife doing laundry, cleaning the house every day, making a home-cooked meal every day, raising children, all while in a dress, high heels, and pearls. I'm still not the 50s housewife, but I am a housewife and I don't mind it. My business gets me out of the house and keeps me busy during long deployments and general hours of boredom. I like having a clean house, I still hate laundry and always will, but I discovered I love cooking. And I'm quite good at it, amateur-ly speaking of course. When Pinterest came around my kitchen was open to so many new opportunities, whoever thought it up is a genius. I never would have run across 99% of the crafts and recipes I've seen if it hadn't been for Pinterest, and now I'm addicted to it, like many others. It mostly satisfies my desire to try new recipes, keeping my husband well fed is a top priority. "The way to a man's heart is through his stomach" is as true today as it was whenever who those words are credited to said them, my husband didn't marry me for my cooking but he was sure as hell surprised at how good I was at it.

So this is yet another Pinterest meal. I've been wanting to try it for a while and finally got up the courage, and the ingredients, to make it last night. To make the prep for this dish go quicker, I suggest cubing the raw chicken beforehand and setting it in the fridge until you're ready to cook it. You could even make the bacon ahead of time but save that grease, you'll be wanting to cook the chicken in it. If you want to see the original recipe, click here, it's brought to you by Chef in Training. I think I deviated a little from her's so I will give you the instructions I used to make mine. This dish is the epitome of comfort food: warm, creamy, the chicken and bacon just go perfectly together, and you'll devour every last bit. You can make it healthier by subbing the heavy cream for milk, I used heavy cream, to hell with healthy. I wanted it to be sinfully delicious!

What you'll need:

10-12 oz penne pasta

2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, thawed

3/4 cup cooked and crumbled bacon

1/4 cup butter

1/4 cup flour

2 cups heavy cream (milk would be fine, too)

1 tsp. onion powder

1 tsp. garlic salt

1/3 cup ranch dressing 

3/4 cup shredded cheddar cheese

Preparation:

1. After chicken is thawed, cut into small cubes and set aside.

2. Cook bacon in skillet, do not toss grease. Crumble bacon and set aside. Start boiling water for pasta and cook according to package directions.

3. Cook chicken in bacon grease until no longer pink inside. Pour off grease and continue cooking chicken for 2 minutes to sear, stirring frequently. 

4. Add bacon and chicken to drained pasta and set aside.

To make sauce

1. Melt butter in medium saucepan. Once melted, add flour and stir to combine (this is called a roux).

2. Once you have your roux, add heavy cream and stir constantly until sauce thickens (I found I had to turn my burner up a few clicks above medium).

3. Remove from heat and add garlic salt, onion powder, and ranch dressing (I used a little more ranch to make it more ranch-y)

Combining everything

1. Add sauce to pasta mixture and stir well to combine. Add cheddar cheese and mix well.

2. Pour whole mixture into a 9x13 baking dish and bake at 350 for 15 minutes.

3. Serve and enjoy!