Chicken Parmesan

adapted from Bobby Flay

The beauty of crusted chicken without the health detriments that come with deep fried food!!! This meal is amazing…and ironic since the beau and I are in the process of becoming vegan. More on that next week. For now, let’s enjoy this beauty.

It comes from Bobby Flay so you know it’s going to be good, and you can make it super spicy if you’d like to.

You’ll need:

4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts

1 cup all purpose flour, seasoned with salt & pepper

2-3 eggs, beaten with 2 T water

2 cups of panko bread crumbs (I used the Italian seasoning flavor)

1 cup of olive oil or vegetable oil

1 small ball of fresh mozzarella

Freshly grated Parmesan to taste

Fresh basil leaves

For the sauce:

1 medium white onion

3 cloves of garlic

1 large can of tomato puree

1 large can of crushed tomatoes

1 small can of tomato paste

Salt, pepper, & Italian seasoning

Ok, so here’s a meal beau and I recently had with some friends. It was great for entertaining, but word to the wise: start this well before company comes if you’re all hungry. Now it’s time to prepare the garlic. On your own, this garlic smashing business would take forever. Thankfully beau’s dad introduced me to this wonderful thing called a garlic press. I highly recommend it.

Once you’ve got your garlic ready, smash it to make a paste.

Finely chop your onions, and put both in your sauce pot to soften. Once soft, add the puree, crushed tomatoes, paste, and 1 cup of water. Bring it to a boil, and then season to taste. Reduce the heat, and let it simmer until slightly thickened – about 30 minutes.

Oven on at 400 degrees. If your Parmesan is not pre-shredded, shred now. And slice the mozzarella.

I wanted pasta on the side (and the sauce recipe makes a ton, so don’t worry!) and I was in the mood for angel hair. I started the water boiling for that and prepared the chicken and three dipping bowls.

Pound the chicken out so they are thin. (Good to get out aggression.)

Season both sides with salt and pepper.

Heat oil in a large sauté pan (or two if you want to cook all four pieces at once) over high heat until the oil is almost smoking. Meanwhile, dredge each breast in the flour and tap or gently shake off the extra.

Dip in egg mixture, again gently shaking the extra off.

Lastly, dredge both sides generously in the bread crumbs.

Add the chicken to the pan and cook about 2 minutes per side.

Place the chicken in a baking pan and top each breast with some tomato sauce…(look at the steam, mmmm! Good shot, Hon.)

a piece of the mozzarella…

and a tablespoon of the Parmesan. Bake in the oven until the chicken is cooked through, and the cheese is melted – about 5-7 minutes. This method of searing the outside and baking the inside leads to moist chicken.

I put the extra Parmesan on the pasta for fun, (ok, really, to make it extra cheesy) and then topped it with sauce (to make the cheese melt of course!)

Add some garlic bread and EAT!