Beach Street Lemon Chicken Linguine

This is the meal my 5 year old requests EVERY single time I ask him what he wants for dinner. He has loved it for years. It’s a little bit spicy and he calls it “spicy chicken”. When he was really little though he called it “Pisees Chegen”. I miss that cute little 3 year old talk sometimes.

A common term over at Thrive Life is “Thrive-a-lize”. Whenever you take one of your favorite recipes and incorporate Thrive foods into it, you have “Thrive-a-lized” a recipe. Since this is such a requested meal in my home I’ve definitely had it Thrive-a-lized a few different ways.

A couple weeks ago Jodi and I were talking about how we can use Thrive lemonade powder. It comes unsweetened so you can add your own sweetener of choice to it. It’s also featured in a lot of yummy dessert recipes. Well I wanted to see if I could use it in a non-dessert recipe and of course this one came to mind.

Let me tell you – I knew it would work – but I wasn’t expecting a last minute alteration that would make me love it even more. So I used the powder straight in the marinade but in addition to that, while we were eating it, I decided to sprinkle some on (like salt) and it was SO good. I loved the zest it gave to the meal. I’ll definitely be subbing out the juice or real lemon for the Thrive lemonade powder every time. IT was so easy! The Lemonade powder is a seasonal item so grab it while it lasts.

Beach Street Lemon Chicken Linguine

1 lb. linguine (or fettuccine)
2 T. olive oil
Zest from one lemon
Juice from one lemon (or sprinkle with Thrive lemonade powder)
½ c. chopped green onion (or Thrive freeze-dried green onions)
¼ c. chopped fresh parsley (or Thrive freeze-dried parsley)
Salt and freshly ground pepper
Parmesan cheese (or Thrive freeze-dried parmesan)

Marinade:
½ c. olive oil
2 cloves garlic, whole
2 T. Cajun seasoning
2 T. lemon juice (or 1 TBS of Thrive lemonade powder)
2 T. minced parsley (or Thrive freeze-dried parsley)
1 T. brown sugar (or more if you like it a little sweeter)
2 T. soy sauce
2 chicken breasts, sliced. (OR 16 extra large shrimp)

Combine the marinade ingredients in a Ziploc bag. Slice thawed chicken (or shrimp). Pat dry and toss in marinade to coat. Refrigerate 1-12 hours. Cook marinated chicken with the marinade sauce in a large saute pan on medium heat until chicken is cooked. If using shrimp, preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Bake for 7-10 minutes. Be sure not to over cook shrimp.

Cook linguine in boiling salted water until done; drain well and rinse noodles. Combine juice of one lemon, zest, olive oil, green onions, and fresh parsley together. Add hot pasta into bowl and toss well. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Add chicken (or shrimp) with marinade into the large pasta bowl. Toss in Parmesan cheese to taste and serve warm.

SIDE NOTE:
As I was entering these ingredients I realized when I started making this recipe none of those Thrive ingredients I listed even existed. I am so grateful to be a part of Thrive because they continually add great new products. I love the parsley and onions because I don’t like buying those fresh and wasting a whole lot of them. And the parmesan is SO much better than the powder stuff and doesn’t go bad!

- Jodi Weiss Schroeder
http://yourthrivelife.com