Love & Pesto: Almond Crusted Chicken with Spinach-Tomato Sauté

I am really excited about this dish! It's one of the those dishes that sends your taste buds into a flavor frenzy.....my mouth was literally watering from the smell of this chicken while it was cooking. When I came home from work last night, I thought to myself, "Restaurants serve macadamia nut crusted fish, so why not cook almond crusted chicken?" In turn, this dish was born and needless to say, I put a little dent in my Costco size bag of almonds :)

Ingredients:

2 boneless, thinly-sliced chicken breasts
Grapeseed oil (I like switching off between olive oil and grapeseed oil because of their different tastes)
5 water crackers (unsalted, plain), crushed
2 - 2 1/2 handfuls of almonds, chopped
Yellow and red tomatoes (I buy these from the farmer's market because I love the color and taste of the tomatoes I find there)
Organic spinach (1/2 a container)
Rice blend (brown, red, and wild rice)
2-3 cloves of fresh garlic
Seasonings = Mediterranean spice blend and white pepper for the chicken, cracked pepper for the spinach and tomatoes

1. Crush 5 water crackers onto a plate. They do not need to be finely crushed, some chunks are okay. They will crisp up on the chicken, leaving a nice crust. Next, add chopped almonds and spices to the plate of crushed crackers. Rub grapeseed oil onto chicken breasts and roll in cracker/almond mix, coating generously.

2. Chop up fresh garlic (1 -2 cloves) and place in a frying pan with 1/4 cup of grapeseed oil. Cook on medium heat until you can smell the aroma of garlic. Then, place chicken breasts in pan and cook 5 minutes a side or until crust is golden brown.

3. Meanwhile, cut up tomatoes and place in frying pan with 2 tbs of grapeseed oil, fresh garlic (1 clove), and cracked. Cook on medium heat until tomatoes are warm and soft. Once soft, add 1/2 container or more spinach and sauté until spinach leaves are slightly wilted, but still bright green in color (about 2-5 minutes depending on how much spinach you use).