Cheat’s Chicken Parmigiana
I made this the other night after finding it on page 85 of this month’s delicious. magazine. It was easy, and delicious.
First, make your tasty breadcrumbs. (hint: this just about makes enough for two meals; store extra in the freezer for next time).
Then, make your tasty tomato sauce topping.
Next, start cooking your chicken breast fillets.
Then assemble everything, and pop it in the oven. See? Easy.
I’ve never made chicken parmigiana, or anything parmigiana, so I have no idea what aspect of this recipe makes it “cheating”.
CHEAT’S CHICKEN PARMIGIANA (serves 4)
1/3 cup olive oil
2 cups fresh breadcrumbs
1/4 cup finely chopped flat-leaf (Continental) parsley
1/2 cup grated parmesan
1 onion, chopped
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1 tbs tomato paste
1 tsp fennel seeds (I didn’t have these)
1 small red chilli (I omitted this too)
400g can chopped tomatoes
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
pinch of caster sugar
4 x 170g chicken breast fillets
4 bocconcini, sliced
Steamed broccolini, to serve
Preheat oven to 200 C.
Place 2 tbs oil in a saucepan over medium heat. Add breadcrumbs and cook, stirring, for 3-4 minutes until golden. Cool slightly, then season. Fold through 2 tbs each parsely and parmesan, then remove from pan and set aside.
In the same pan, heat 1 tbs oil over med-high heat. Cook onion and garlic, stirring, for 2-3 minutes until soft. Add tomato paste, fennel and chilli, then cook for 1 minute or until fragrant. Add tomato, Worcestershire, sugar and 60ml water, then simmer, stirring occasionally, for 8-10 minutes or until thick. Taste for seasoning… I used a tablespoon of Worcestershire sauce and about a tablespoon of sugar in the end.
At this point, I steamed some broccolini in the microwave until just-done. Then I found some slivered almonds in the pantry (I had searched unsuccessfully for pine nuts). I heated a frying pan over medium heat, tossed the almonds in and let them toast for a couple of minutes until they started to brown then I turned the heat off and left them for a while…
Heat remaining 1 tbs oil in an ovenproof frying pan over med-high heat (if you don’t have something that will go from the stovetop to the oven, just cook in the frying pan then transfer to an oven-proof dish).
Season the chicken and cook for 5 minutes, then turn and cook for a further 2 minutes until just golden.
Transfer to the oven and bake for 5 minutes…. I put some lemon-infused olive oil into the frying pan with the almonds and heated it up again. When the oil was hot, I tossed in the broccolini…
…I put the now-hot veggies in a serving dish for everyone to help themselves to at the table.
Back to the chicken…
Spoon over sauce and top with bocconcini and remaining parmesan, then cook for a further 2-3 minutes until chicken is cooked through and the cheese is melted.
I forgot to take a photo of it in the baking dish with the breadcrumbs on top.
Slice chicken and arrange on plates. (I skipped the slicing part).
Add some tasty greens and voila!
That’s dinner solved for me tonight, and I don’t have to give it another thought all day (I seem to spend half my time trying to solve the dinner issue these days aaaaaaaagh!)
Yummity. I think that chicken parmigiana was the first recipe that I ever tried of the ‘net. Got a big thumbs up from the man too –
going to try this one also.
Yum, looks absolutely delish! And I’m not sure about the cheating part either – I’ve got a way cheat-ier version that hits our table as a quick mid-week dinner.