Hey, friends. It’s been a hot minute! Jim and I road tripped to see my family for a pre-Thanksgiving gathering last week and I spent a lot of time in my mom’s kitchen. She and Jim had to work during our visit, so I was left to amuse myself in the kitchen. (Oh, the horror.) Beef tenderloin, homemade ice cream, a hilarious variety of Christmas cookies, homemade Snickers bars, and slow-cooked shredded carnitas were the orders of the day! I learned a bit about pulling hard candy (which burned my palms and exerted my biceps more than they’re used to) by making a coconut lime “twist,” though, if I’m being honest, they looked more like disgusting Grinch fingers. I’ll try this again soon as I think I’m starting a candy phase.
I also managed to shoot my next PUTZY episode: Croissants! If I ever manage to complete the video editing–which, I’ve found I’m rather neurotic about–it will be available for public viewing on YouTube by next Wednesday, only one month later than promised. Oh well. Delay is preferable to delivering crappy film footage. That’s what Thomas Jefferson always says.
It has been a productive and very fun vacation, but my blogging fell by the wayside a bit. I guess there is such thing as too much fun. When we returned home, we spent Thanksgiving with Jim’s family, and I finally watched Christmas Vacation. I think I’m too daft to get the humor in it? Regardless, I appreciate the official kickoff to THE MOST WONDERFUL TIME OF THE YEAR! Immediately after Thanksgiving, Jim and I bought our first (fresh) Christmas tree, a handsome Fraser fir. Miraculously, we also managed to host the whole family over that same day, after decorating the house for Christmas and grocery shopping for fresh pasta and meatballs. (Well when I put it like that, it doesn’t sound that miraculous, but I can assure you we were amazed at the feat.)
Christmas is the best and I am fully prepared for a cookie-decorating party fit with a hot chocolate bar and caroling through the streets. With that said, I wanted to share with you a very summer-season dish, Chicken Francese. Francese is Italian for “French,” however, Chicken Francese is actually an American-created dish. Since I don’t know how to pronounce “Francese,” and since it doesn’t seem like a very apt name anyway, I think I’ll petition an official rename of this dish to lemon-and-champagne-in-a-butter-sauce chicken because that’s much more pithy.
It’s a very lemon-y dish and will make you pucker! But it’s yummy and fresh, and will give you a taste of summer during the best of winter.
Ingredients
1 lb skinless, boneless chicken breasts, sliced into thin, flat cutlets
1 egg
1 tbsp milk
Salt and pepper
2/3 cup all-purpose flour
2 tbsp grated Parmesan cheese
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tsp onion salt
2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil plus 1 tbsp butter, for frying
3 tbsp salted butter
1 clove minced garlic
1 cup dry white wine or champagne
Juice of one lemon, plus the zest of half the lemon
1 cup chicken broth
1 tbsp heavy whipping cream
Parsley, chopped for garnish (optional)
1/2 lb cooked angel hair pasta tossed with butter and grated Romano
Process
In a shallow bowl whisk together the egg, milk, salt and pepper. In a gallon-sized Ziploc bag combine flour, 2 tbsp grated Parmesan cheese, garlic powder, and onion salt. Shake to combine.
Dip the flattened chicken cutlets in the egg mixture and then transfer to the flour bag to coat. Once all cutlets are in the flour bag, seal it and shift the chicken pieces around to ensure they are completely dredged in the flour mixture.
In a large skillet, heat olive oil and butter on medium heat until very hot. Arrange chicken in the skillet and cook 4 minutes per side, or until cooked fully, and there’s a browned crust on each plane. When all chicken pieces are cooked, transfer them to a paper-towel lined plate and set aside.
Wipe out the pan with a paper towel and return to medium heat. Melt 3 tbsp salted butter and when it’s hot, add the minced garlic. Sautee until golden and fragrant and then add the wine or champagne. It will bubble as the wine flashes from the high heat. Add the lemon juice and zest and cook and stir until the liquid is syrupy, about 3 minutes. Drizzle in the chicken broth and cook and stir until the liquid is reduced by half. It should be thick and velvety. Last, whisk in the heavy whipping cream.
Add the fried chicken pieces back to the pan and spoon the sauce over them on low heat. Serve immediately by dishing a few pieces of chicken with the sauce over a bed of angel hair pasta. Garnish with parsley.
A short note on cookies...
I also have a small note on shortbread cookies based on how many batches I have made in the last two weeks. If you have trouble with your dough coming together, you can add cream or milk like I noted in my post on chocolate caramel shortbread, but it will not have the desired dry texture of true shortbread cookies. To get that true, dry texture, there is one critical step you must take. After creaming 1 cup of butter with 1/2 cup brown sugar, you have to add 2 cups of flour verrrrrrrrrrrrrrry slowly. If you add it too quickly, you’ll have crumbly dough. I think this happens because the fat globules from the butter get coated with too much flour at once when you dump all the flour in at the same time. If you introduce the flour slowly, there’s more room for it.
In my croissant endeavors, I realized a technique that could cross over into cookies. If you want a straight edge for your cookie dough, roll it with a rolling pin by sandwiching your dough between two sheets of Cling Wrap or Press ‘n’ Seal. This helps to keep your rolling pin clean, ergo, fewer dishes, AND you can use the plastic wrap to fold the dough at the edge into a straight line. I’ll demonstrate this technique in an upcoming video, but send me a comment with any questions!
What a great post! I love all food you make….come home soon and let’s bake some Christmas cookies! smooches! mom