Tuesday, May 09, 2006

Light Chicken Parmigiana


This looks fried, does'nt it? It's not. And it tastes sort of fried too. The secret, you ask? Ok, the breadcrumbs are sauted in a tablespoon of olive oil (which we all know by now is good for us).

I can't take the credit for this ingenious idea. It is a recipe from Cook's Illustrated new Light Cookbook. I have'nt ordered it yet but it is on my wish list. I got the recipe in the Providence Journal's food section one week.
They suggest using Panko breadcrumbs because they stay crispier.

I went a step further to make them even healthier. I used whole wheat Panko breadcrumbs. The idea is to saute the breadcrumbs before breading the chicken cutlets. This way, much less oil is used and/or absorbed into the chicken.

You batter the cutlet just like the traditional recipe: coat in flour, then in egg, then in the sauted and cooled breadcrumbs mixed with parmigiano reggiano and I suggest garlic powder,italian seasoning and fresh parsley.

Bake on a rack(Spray the rack and cutlets with olive oil, I use mazola pure) on a cookie sheet in a 475 degree oven for about 10 to 15 minutes depending on the thickness of your cutlets.

Add some mariara sauce, grated mozzarella cheese, grated parmigian reggiano cheese and pop back in the oven for 5 minutes to melt the cheeses.

They were pretty good. They even impressed my mom who has fried her share of chicken cutlets. Give it a try. Let me know how it worked out for you.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Bambola,that was great Ann,thank you.