Cardio and Cooking: Celebratory Chicken Parmesan

Half way through today, I breathed a sigh of relief. I've been scrambling for the past couple of weeks to get a professor to supervise my research project for next term, and with only the weekend to spare, I finally got an approval. For some reason, the idea of chicken parmesan sounded pretty good, so I went with it! I can work it off at badminton tonight :)

Things I have learned today about chicken parmesan:

- Chicken parmesan is surprisingly easy to make! It only takes about 25 minutes total.

- I didn't learn this today, but this is a trick for not cooking too much pasta. You can make 1 decent serving of linguine/fettuccine/spaghetti noodles by making a circle with your thumb and index finger so that is about the size of a quarter (the coin), and filling the hole with as many dry noodles as you can fit in that space.

- Most of the cheese on top of the chicken parmesan is actually mozzarella. I made mine without parmesan because I didn't have any parmesan, and just wanted an excuse to use my cheese. 

- According to Wikipedia, it's a regular pub food in Australia? Also, despite its appearance with pasta at places like Boston Pizza, it's apparently typically served with chips (Australian chips, i.e. French fries) and salad. Well, my world just got overturned...fries and salad? Who knew?

My first chicken parmesan. I've actually never had it in a restaurant either.

Chicken "Parmesan" for One (Adapted from The Food Network)

1 chicken breast

3-4 Tbsp all purpose flour

Salt and pepper

1 egg

1/4 cup breadcrumbs (I just used Panko)

1/2 cup spaghetti sauce (I used Ragu because it was on sale at Loblaws)

1 serving of noodle pasta (I used linguine because it's my favourite, and it was on sale at Loblaws)

1/4 cup shredded mozzarella cheese

1. Preheat oven to 450 F. Line a small baking pan with parchment paper and set aside.

2. Place your chicken breast in a ziploc bag, and seal almost all the way, just so there is some room for air to escape. Use your fist to pound the chicken breast flatter. (It's supposed to make the chicken thinner and therefore easy to cook, but I don't know if it really did anything. It was fun though :D)

3. Add a sprinkle of salt and pepper to flour on a plate, and stir roughly. Beat an egg in a small bowl. On another plate, add breadcrumbs. 

4. Dredge the flattened chicken breast in the flour mixture to coat both sides, then the beaten egg to coat, then the breadcrumbs to coat. Place the chicken breast on your lined baking pan. 

5. Spoon about 3 Tbsp of sauce on top of the chicken breast. 

6. Sprinkle mozzarella cheese evenly across the top of the chicken breast.

7. Place in the oven and bake for 20 minutes until the chicken is cooked through, and the mozzarella is slightly browned.

8. While the chicken is baking in the oven, you can boil some water for pasta and prepare according to instructions. Mine was Barilla linguine, and it took about 9 minutes over medium heat until al dente. After the pasta is cooked, pour into strainer, and place the pot back on the element and set heat to medium-low. Add the rest of the sauce into the pot and cover with a lid to heat. 

9. Add cooked pasta to a plate with your choice of veggies for a side. Spoon heated sauce over your pasta. Remove chicken parmesan from the oven, and carefully place it on top of your bed of pasta. Buon Appetito!

Mmm...celebratory meals are fantabulous. Even at 3 in the afternoon :)

-M