Last night, I made the third practice for this dish while Jeff watched (which is ironic, considering he was the one who thought we needed a third try). The main thing we wanted to make sure of was timing aspects, because we've modified the cooking time of the chicken and the mushrooms slightly.
The chicken has turned out consistently wonderful. I absolutely adore how the breading of the chicken turns into the yellow color of the lemon zest after it cooks. The pesto has also been consistently good after finding this new lemon pesto recipe. Unfortunately, I was only able to scrounge up a full cup of pesto this time rather than the 1 1/2 cups for the full recipe (how does Martin's not have basil?), so I adjusted the recipe slightly in size. I also changed the pine nuts to walnuts, and I was pleased to find that I couldn't taste the difference. Once the pine nuts we already bought are gone, we will be using walnuts for future pesto.
I remembered to add the thyme to the mushrooms at the right time, and did some sample tasting to see if it was actually enough. It wasn't, so I added more until I could taste enough to be flavorful. Unfortunately, I really have no exact idea how much I added, so I'll have to guestimate and continue taste testing. The only other problem I've been having with this dish is serving it warm enough. This might be solved if/when we use the oven to keep them at temperature before they're served.
If you're paying enough attention to when this is being posted, you may realize that the final dinner was supposed to be tonight. Unfortunately, Jeff's niece is sick, so they left a little later than expected. The dinner has been postponed until tomorrow night.
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