Healthier 30 Minute Chicken Spinach Alfredo ?

          

               Lighten up a classic Fettuccine Alfredo recipe with this easy pasta recipe! Ready in 30 minutes with no heavy cream.

 A great healthy recipe for busy weeknights with chicken and plenty of fresh spinach

ALFREDOOOOOOO. Is there anything better than pasta that’s drowning in butter and cream and cheese and more cheese? I think not. Is there anything worse for that New Year’s Diet Resolution you’re pretending to keep? Probably also not. But hey, I’ve got you (and our TOTALLY REAL, no-I-have-NOT-been-binge-eating-this-pizza 2015 diet) covered.

I lightened up this creamy, cheese-y sauce by nixing the cream altogether and instead using a roux with skim milk. Chicken and spinach add some protein (and other probably-important nutrients, blah, blah) and some color to the mix, and finally we thin the sauce out a bit by recycling some of our nice, starchy pasta water. Creamy? Check. Something green? Check. Hearty and filling? Check. Ready in less time than it takes to accidentally-on-purpose watch JUST ONE MORE EPISODE of Revenge? YOU BETCHA. Lightened-up, still-creamy, even-has-spinach-so-it’s-basically-health-food, 30 minute pasta Alfredo.

I’ve been all about these 30 minute meals lately. Nothing that requires more than one pot! Nothing that requires me to leave my house (snow = ugh) and go to the store! Nothing that doesn’t pair fabulously with a very large glass of wine! You catch my drift. 

I’ve finally had the last straw with how disorganized our kitchen is, and doing anything that takes a ton of time or makes a big mess just makes me want to hop on a bus to iHop and drown my sorrows in a giant Belgian waffle.

We moved into this apartment almost six months ago (time. it flies) and I still feel like I’m living inside a tornado. Our apartment is lovely, but it’s SMALL, and doing a storage/organization overhaul just isn’t something we’ve had time for. We also move so much that it’s almost not worth being totally unpacked in a place, because we’ll just have to pack it all back up again.

Kyle and I have each moved AT LEAST once a year since we were 18. Our last apartment here had a closet full of boxes that were never even opened.

But the other day, when I was hungry and scrounging for the ingredients to throw this YET ANOTHER 30 minute pasta dish together, I realized that I didn’t even really want to be in the kitchen. My KITCHEN! My happy place that also holds all the food and the beer! How depressing is that? So I decided it’s time for an overhaul.

It’s hard to do any kind of “remodel” in an apartment, because we can’t really change anything. I also have zero money, because I decided it would be A REALLY GOOD IDEA to go to grad school. But I’m determined.

 I’m insanely busy with The Sustainable Seafood Blog Conference (WHICH YOU SHOULD ALL COME TO) and the whole “getting my Master’s” thing, but I also know that if I don’t make the time and spend the money to reclaim something as simple as being excited to hang out in the kitchen, then everything else will pretty much just suck.

 So my goal is this: take a few hundred bucks. Give my kitchen a makeover. Take lots of pictures so I can share it all with you. COOK ALL OF THE THINGS IN 2015. We’ll start with another batch of this Healthier 30 Minute Chicken Spinach Alfredo. Sound good? Good. Onward!