Pan-Roasted Chicken with Beans & Potatoes

Last night was another Pinterest recipe kind of night. I went over to Jeff's house, and made us this yummy meal! It was super easy, didn't include many ingredients, and tasted pretty good. (I will make changes next time, so look for those tips/suggestions at the end of the post...) So, HERE is the link to the original recipe from Real Simple, and I'm also going to lay it all on here too...

Picture via the Real Simple recipe link

Ingredients
Boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1 Lemon (1/2 sliced, 1/2 for juicing) {Recipe said 2, and that's what I used, but it was a bit too much}
Head of garlic (3 cloves diced, others whole)
6 tbsp. of Extra Virgin Olive Oil (EVOO)
Small onion, chopped (wasn't in recipe, but I added it in there)
Green beans (I used canned, but fresh would have been better)
Red potatoes (Quartered)
Salt and Pepper (S&P)

Directions
Preheat oven to 450 degrees
Coat baking dish with 1 tbsp. of EVOO.
Line bottom of dish with sliced lemons
Throw in a couple whole cloves of garlic
Combine: 5 tbsp. EVOO, 3 diced garlic cloves, lemon juice, and S&P
Add beans to oil mixture to coat, remove with tongs or slotted spoon and place over sliced lemons
Add potatoes to oil mixture to coat, remove with tongs or slotted spoon (I just grabbed with my hand)
Line outside rim of dish with potatoes, leaving center open for chicken
Throw in chopped onions
Add chicken to oil mixture to coat, place over beans
(Our chicken breasts were very thick, so we cut a long slit in the top of each of them, in order to cook better)
Pour any remaining oil mixture into the dish, and squeeze more lemon juice on top
Bake entire dish for 45-50 minutes
Serve!

OK - here's the deal with this recipe... Then beans and potatoes ended up soaking up most of the lemon flavor, and I thought the veggies were really yummy. (Jeff said they were "too lemon-y.") The chicken however remained a little bit too bland. We both used extra S&P after serving, and that helped a bit, but the chicken could still have used a bit more of something. 

Turns out other people thought so too, because when I went back and read the reviews this morning, that's pretty much what everyone had said. Too bad I didn't read them beforehand so I could have corrected the problem before I even knew there would be one! Oh well, I will definitely make some of these improvements next time. It was super easy to make, and tasty enough, so I'm sure I will make it again. I will just kick it up a notch in the future!

Suggestions
Easiest tip would be just sprinkle the whole dish with extra seasoning, i.e. oregano, basil, or an Italian blend
Marinate the chicken in oil mixture - I would have cut tiny slits in the chicken before marinating so it could absorb
Add some lemon pepper seasoning on top of the chicken
Spice it up a bit with some red pepper flakes on top of the chicken
Use a mix of dried thyme, rosemary and basil to add in the oil mixture

Basically - just use less lemon, and more herbs and spices, and I think that should do it!

Again, overall it was a good meal, and soo easy to make. It just needs a little bit of extra jazzing-up from the original recipe, and it would be a knockout one-pan-meal! Let me know if you try this, or what you might add to the dish to make it your own! I would love some extra suggestions for my next attempt :)