Happy Anniversary to Me and Grilled Chicken Pasta

Today is our 9th wedding anniversary! I can't believe it's been that long already, yet I feel like I've known E forever. Tonight we are having dinner at Elmwood at Sparks. I'm excited! I've always wanted to eat dinner there. Todd and Carrie gave us a gift certificate so now we are "forced" to try it. :) I like that they try to keep their ingredients local. If anybody is ever in this area, you can check out their website at http://www.elmwoodcatering.com/. Oh, and they cater (obviously!) They catered our friends' wedding and the food was sooo good. I've had lunch there several times and absolutely love it, but now I finally get to try their dinners and I'm so looking forward to the ravioli. I've had my eye on that for several months now.

I made a really good (and very simple) pasta dish for lunch yesterday. I didn't take a pic, but the recipe is sooo simple:

Grilled Chicken Pasta

1 grilled chicken breast (seasoned however you wish), chopped
2 cups cooked whole-grain penne pasta
1/2 cup red grapes, cut in half
2 Tbsp celery, chopped
1/2 cup light sour cream
1 Tbsp fresh basil
Salt and pepper to taste

Throw all of the ingredients into a bowl and stir. Enjoy!

I grilled the chicken and boiled the penne while I was getting everything else together. Yesterday I ate it warm and today I heated it up very slightly. It's okay cold, but much better warm. I seasoned the chicken with this new seasoning I got from Tastefully Simple. Oh, how I love Tastefully Simple. It's called Green Tea Peppercorn Seasoning. Divine! I'm having a party next month so I'm going to have to stock up on it since it's just seasonal.

For the basil, I only use fresh basil. You can use 1 tsp dried if you like, but it just doesn't taste the same. There's nothing like fresh basil. We still have a basil plant left from last year. Actually, we now have two. I cut a nice stem off the plant and rooted it. I didn't use any rooting hormones or anything like that. I just cut the stem, put it in a jar full of water and left it in the window sill. We don't get any direct sunlight in the kitchen so it only had indirect light. After a while you'll notice a slime ball growing where it was cut and then a few days later you'll start to see the roots growing. I'm so fascinated with all of this!

Anyway, I have lots to do. I have a lot of baking to do for Saturday and I have so much I need to plant in the garden. Will there ever be enough time to do everything???