January 20, 2008

Chicken Parmesan


We love Italian food for all its rich sauces, flavorful ingredients and aromatic herbs.We are big fans of Chicken Parmesan, Gnocchi and Capresse to name a few. We were introduced to Italian food by Giada De Laurentiis, the sexy Food Network chef on Everyday Italian. We admit, we started watching her show just for her- she had that Hollywood Glamour, very unlike most chefs. We loved watching Everyday Italian for Giada's beauty, dress, fashion and sex appeal(We bet she is every woman's envy) before we fell in love with her cooking. As we kept watching her shows, slowly our attention focussed beyond her to her cooking- we realised that her recipes were simple and healthy, not to say authentic(fed up of amercianized food)while adding a gourmet feel to it. We started downloading all her shows with the intent to try them out slowly. But it never happened. Today was the day! We decided to start with the most popular Chicken Parmesan and hey, we don't have words to say how good it tasted. This recipe beats some of the best parmesan dishes we have eaten. Thanks Giada, for putting those wonderful recipes out there for Italian food fanatics like us.

Preparation time: 10 mins
Cooking time:12-15 mins


chicken breats 1 lb
shredded mozzarella(natural and fresh-top quality)1/2 cup
shredded parmesan cheese 1/4 cup or as required( top quality)
1 tbsp chopped fresh Italian parsley
1 tbsp chopped fresh rosemary
1 tbsp chopped fresh thyme
3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 tbsp unsalted butter
1/2 cup thick tomato sauce( we used store bought one; you can make it from scratch if you like- see the link here.)
fresh pepper from the mill
salt

Take a small bowl. Add olive oil, herbs, salt and pepper. Mix well. Rub this herb mix on both sides of the chicken. Take a skillet and heat it on a high flame. Add the chicken pieces and cook until brown on each side( around 3 mins each side). Remove from skillet and keep aside. Take a baking dish, spray it with PAM. Spread half the tomato sauce. Add the chicken pieces. Spread the remaining tomato sauce over the pieces. Sprinkle mozzarella and parmesan to cover the entire baking dish. Sprinkle butter pieces on different areas of the baking dish. Pre-heat the oven to 500 degrees F. Cook till the cheese melts and the chicken cooks. We baked for around 15 minutes. Eat it with a side of Italian bread like Ciabatta dipped in herb olive oil mix. Tastes divine!

Enjoy!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Divine indeed is Italian food! and so is Giada, her beauty and her recipes too :-)
I totally agree with you guys here. I love these kind of simple baked recipes when i get bored of the regular masaledaar curries and rice and dals..

www.zaiqa.net

Divya and Chaya said...

Thanks Mona- we feel the same too. Indian food can be quite heavy and to break away from this is try to indulge in other cuisinesonce in a while.