Simple, healthy meals - Chicken breasts & spaghetti squash

For some reason eating healthily at home is not always as easy as it sounds like it will be. Maybe because you have to keep things movin' and groovin' otherwise you want to tear your hair out or run to the nearest greasy spoon or bakery and shove fried food and/or pastry into your mouth as fast as possible...

or maybe that's just me.

But REGARDLESS, if I had a penny for every time a friend of mine or I say (martini in hand) "No, I'm really going to start eating healthy this week" I would have SEVERAL pennies.

And I hate it when someone touts a recipe as being simple and there is basting, peeling, roasting, pureeing, zesting, chilling invovled - THAT'S NOT SIMPLE. You know what's simple? Cereal. So when I say "simple" I mean a step above cereal... and that step is using the stove or oven.

One of my all-time favorite recipes is baked chicken breasts. Plain chicken breasts? Not so good. Chicken breasts covered in Herbs de Provence? Fuckin good.

Take two halves of a chicken breast and lightly cover them in olive oil. Shake a decent coating of Herbs de Provence on the tops of the breast and bake at 375 for 30-40 mins or so, depending on the size of the breast. Et voila - a tasty protein dish. Sound too simple? Try it. I eat it at least once a week and have been serving it to my boyfriend for several months and each time he says (as he did last night having prepared it himself for the first time) "You have somethin here with this recipe...it's always good."

I usually pair it with steamed asparagus with a touch of butter and salt and pepper or a sprinkling of shaved, fresh Parmesan or steamed artichokes. Last night, however, my boyfriend cooked a new favorite of ours which is very healthy and tasty - spaghetti squash.

Halve the spaghetti squash and remove the seeds, placing the halves face-down in a baking dish coated with cooking spray and cook them at 375 F for about 35 minutes or until you can pierce the shell easily.

Let cool for a few minutes and using a fork or spaghetti server scrape out the meat of the squash and place in a large bowl. We usually add our own homemade marinara sauce made with canned and/or fresh tomatoes, mushrooms, basil and garlic. It makes for a filling, healthy meal that feels like you're eating pasta - but you're not!

My boyfriend is not a squash-person. He says it's often too sweet for him and in general doesn't seek it out, but after I served him spaghetti squash for the first time at the end of the last cold season he said, "I may never eat spaghetti again this is so good". Now I know some pasta lovers would definitely beg to differ, but what I'm trying to say is - it's good.