The second recipe I decided to try out for my cookbook challenge came from the January/February issue of Cooking Light. Cooking Light is the only magazine I actually subscribe to and I enjoy it. 90% of the food blogs I follow are very decadent, so I like that I have an alternative, since it is more in line with what I like to/try to eat. I’d say from every magazine I probably find 2-3 recipes I’d like to try, so it’s worth it.

The recipe for this issue that stuck out the most for me was Stuffed Chicken & Herb Gravy with Polenta.

We like chicken, we like gravy. I hated polenta the time I had it at home, but it was from a tube so I had higher hopes for this one.

I actually cooked up the chicken/gravy on Tuesday while I was making chicken for something else and made the Polenta last night. We also had green beans from a can because we are classy. (And I hate bacon. And hate fresh cooked green beans.)

I didn’t use fresh thyme and probably accidentally used too much dried thyme to replace it, my grave tasted a little grassy. I added some sage to it and that seemed to help. Also added way more salt (and pepper) to the polenta.

Pardon the iphone photos, if I was pulling out my real camera, these would never get posted.

We were fans! The prosciutto got a little lost in the chicken and if I hadn’t known there was provolone in there I probably also wouldn’t have noticed. Maybe double those amounts, or use thinner chicken.

The polenta was creamy and wonderful. The gravy was good, it was my first try at real gravy and it came out well! The sage even helped tame the grassiness of the thyme. Looking forward to leftovers tonight.

Also – all that for under 500 calories? Two thumbs up!