Easy Italian Chicken Skillet

The weekends in Grinnell continue. Roger's alone. The house is the same house and a different house — same furniture, same stove, same crop reports on the TV, but the absence of Marlene has changed the molecular structure of the place, the way the absence of a load-bearing wall changes a building. The house is standing. The house is also leaning.

Roger's garden is smaller this year. He planted tomatoes — four plants instead of ten, because ten required Marlene's help and four is what one man with a bypassed heart can manage alone. He planted the sunflowers — always the sunflowers, the Marlene sunflowers, the flowers that were for her and are now for her memory and the distinction between the two is the same distinction between "present" and "past tense," and Roger plants them in the present tense because the present tense is where the love lives, even when the person the love is for lives in the past.

I stocked his freezer. I cleaned his kitchen. I sat on the porch with him Saturday evening and we watched the fields — the Weber fields that are someone else's fields now, planted in corporate corn this year, the rows perfectly straight in a way that Roger's rows were never straight because Roger believed that perfectly straight rows were a sign of someone who cared more about appearance than soil, and he was right.

He said, "She told me to water the garden." I said, "She told me more frosting." He said, "That sounds right." We sat. We watched. The fields were green and the sun was setting and the evening was the temperature that Iowa evenings are in March, which is almost warm, almost spring, almost the thing you've been waiting for, and almost is the season we live in now — almost together, almost whole, almost enough. Almost.

I drove home Sunday and made lemon chicken with capers. My recipe. The recipe that is mine and not Marlene's. The recipe that proves I exist as a cook independent of my mother, that my kitchen has a voice that is not her voice, that the teacher made a student who makes things the teacher never imagined. The capers. The artichoke hearts. The Mediterranean in Iowa. Mine. Both hers and mine. Everything in this kitchen is both.

I make this every time I come home from Grinnell—not because I planned it that way, but because it’s become the thing my hands reach for when my heart needs to do something that belongs entirely to me. The capers are mine. The artichoke hearts are mine. The hit of lemon at the end that opens the whole dish up like a window—mine. Marlene never made anything like this, and that’s not a betrayal; it’s a continuation. If you’ve been sitting on a porch watching the light go out of the sky and feeling the full weight of “almost,” this skillet is the right thing to come home and make.

Prep Time: 10 minutes | Cook Time: 25 minutes | Total Time: 35 minutes | Servings: 4

Ingredients

4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (about 6 oz each), pounded to even thickness
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon dried Italian seasoning
2 tablespoons olive oil
4 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cup dry white wine (or low-sodium chicken broth)
1 cup low-sodium chicken broth
1 can (14 oz) artichoke hearts, drained and quartered
3 tablespoons capers, drained and rinsed
1/2 cup cherry tomatoes, halved
Juice of 1 large lemon (about 3 tablespoons)
1 tablespoon cold unsalted butter
2 tablespoons fresh flat-leaf parsley, chopped

Instructions

Season the chicken. Pat chicken breasts dry with paper towels. Season both sides with salt, pepper, garlic powder, and Italian seasoning.
Sear until golden. Heat olive oil in a large, heavy skillet over medium-high heat until shimmering. Add chicken and sear without moving for 5–6 minutes per side, until deeply golden and cooked through (internal temperature 165°F). Transfer to a plate and tent loosely with foil.
Build the sauce base. Reduce heat to medium. Add minced garlic to the pan drippings and cook, stirring, for 30 seconds until fragrant but not browned. Pour in the white wine and scrape up any browned bits from the bottom of the pan. Let it reduce by half, about 2 minutes.
Add the broth and vegetables. Pour in the chicken broth. Add the artichoke hearts, capers, and cherry tomatoes. Simmer over medium heat for 5–6 minutes, until the tomatoes have softened and the sauce has reduced slightly.
Finish with lemon and butter. Remove the skillet from heat. Stir in the lemon juice and cold butter, swirling until the butter is melted and the sauce is glossy.
Return the chicken and serve. Nestle the seared chicken breasts back into the skillet and spoon the sauce generously over the top. Scatter fresh parsley over everything. Serve directly from the pan with crusty bread, orzo, or roasted potatoes.

Nutrition (per serving)

Easy Italian Chicken Skillet — The Recipe That Is Mine