Parmesan Chicken Breasts with Crispy Prosciutto

This recipe is especially for my dear friend, Belinda, who apparently has a surplus of boneless, skinless chicken breasts in her freezer.   It is one of my favorites from Jamie Oliver’s Ministry of Food, published in the US as Food Revolution, where, for some bizarre reason, the Parmesan was omitted from the recipe.  I can’t imagine why.

Ingredients

2-3 sprigs of fresh thyme

30g or 1 oz Parmesan cheese

2 skinless chicken breasts

Freshly ground black pepper

1 lemon

4-5 slices of prosciutto or Parma ham – about 70g or 2.5 oz

Olive oil

Method

Pick the thyme leaves off the stalks.   If there are some very fine stalks which just break when you try to remove the leaves, just chop those up and group with the leaves. Grate your Parmesan.

Lay some cling film on a cutting board and place the breasts on the plastic.  Carefully score the underside of the chicken breasts in a criss-cross fashion with a small knife.

Season with a little pepper (You don’t need salt as the prosciutto and Parmesan are quite salty).  Lay your breasts next to each other and sprinkle over most of the thyme leaves.

Grate a little lemon zest over them.

Put half of the Parmesan on each breast.

Lay two prosciutto slices on each chicken breast, overlapping them slightly. If there happens to be a fifth slice in your package, as mine had, cut it in half and put one piece on each breast on top of the other two slices.

Put a square of plastic wrap over each breast and give them a few really good bashes with the bottom of a saucepan until they are about ½ inch or 1cm thick.

This  is the fun part!  Give it a jolly good bash. 

Put a frying pan over a medium heat. Remove the plastic wrap and carefully transfer the chicken breasts, prosciutto-side down, into the pan.

Drizzle over some olive oil. Cook for three minutes on each side, turning halfway through.

Either serve the chicken breasts whole or cut them into thick slices and pile them on a plate.   Serve with lemon wedges for squeezing over and a sprinkle of the few leftover thyme leaves. 

Enjoy!

Chicken Tetrazzini

As a child, I remember eating turkey tetrazzini after Thanksgiving or Christmas, the most common times we had leftover turkey.  I figured, at the time, that it was an American concoction (Who else eats turkey?!) based on an Italian pasta dish, so imagine my surprise when Spaghetti Tetrazzini showed up in Jamie’s Italy!  His story goes that he was outside his parents’ pub and an elderly couple happened by. When they heard he was going to Italy, they told him to make sure he cooked turkey tetrazzini.  He had never heard of it.  Didn’t I feel smug, having enjoyed it on several occasions?  Eventually he found a recipe for chicken tetrazzini in an Italian cookbook.

After a little research, and by this I mean a Google search culminating at Wikipedia, it turns out that the original dish is indeed TURKEY Tetrazzini and it is named after an Italian opera singer, Luisa Tetrazzini, who immigrated to the United States, making her US debut in San Francisco in 1905.  The recipe is most often credited to Chef Ernest Arbogast of the Palace Hotel in San Francisco, where Ms. Tetrazzini was a long-term guest.

Wikipedia says that Ms. Tetrazzini got quite stout as she aged but she could still “act effectively, especially in lively or comic roles.”  My favorite quote: “I am old and I am fat, but I am still Tetrazzini!”  When you see how much Parmesan and cream goes into this, you will know exactly how it happened. 

Ingredients

6 chicken breasts (about 1200g or 2 1/2 lbs)

500g or 1lb of ground (minced) chicken or pork

1/3 oz or 8.5g hot Italian sausage seasonings

1 egg

Olive oil

250g or 9 oz baby portabella mushrooms or other mixed mushrooms, cleaned

Sea salt

Black pepper

6 cloves of garlic

2 cups dry white wine

2 lbs or 1kg dried linguine

14 oz or 400g Parmesan

4 1/4 cups or 1 liter heavy whipping cream

2 sprigs of fresh basil, leaves picked

Method

Preheat your oven to 400°F or 190°C.

Slice up the chicken breasts in thin pieces.  Salt and pepper them and add a good couple of glugs of olive oil.  Set them aside or in the refrigerator. 

Put your ground chicken or pork into a large mixing bowl. Add the sausage seasonings and one egg.  (Let me say at this point that I believe the sausage meatballs are tastier made with pork, if your religious sensibilities allow.) 

Drizzle some olive oil onto a baking tray. Mix your meat, egg and seasonings up thoroughly and, using a spoon or small scoop, divide the mixture into small pieces. 

This was a gift from my dear friend, Jacky. I think of her every time I use it!

Roll the pieces between your two palms until they are round.  Pop in the oven for 20-25 minutes, stirring them around once, halfway through.

Meanwhile, in a pan big enough for all of your ingredients, add a little olive oil and brown the chicken.

As it browns, slice your garlic very finely and break up the mushrooms into bite-sized pieces.   

When the chicken is browned, add in the garlic and mushrooms.  Give the pot a good stir.

Add in the wine.  Turn down to a simmer and put the lid on. 

By this time, your meatballs should be ready.   Add them into the simmering chicken and put a little of the juice from the pot into the baking tray so you can scrape the browned goodness off and into the chicken pot. 

Simmer until the chicken is tender and the wine is slightly reduced.

Meanwhile, cook the pasta according to package instructions and drain well.  

Add the cream to the pan of chicken and meatballs.  Bring to the boil then turn the heat off.  Season to taste with salt and freshly ground black pepper.

WE ARE TALKING A LITER OF CREAM HERE, PEOPLE!

That's boiling, folks!

Add the drained pasta to the creamy mixture and toss well to coat. 

I found it easiest to use two wooden spatulas. That much pasta and sauce is heavy.

Add three-quarters of the Parmesan and all of the basil and stir again.

Pour into an oven-proof dish and sprinkle with half of the remaining Parmesan.  

Bake until golden and bubbling and crispy on top.   Serve with the extra Parmesan on the side so everyone can help herself.  (I say herself, because, you might have guessed, Chicken Tetrazzini is what my Pokeno ladies ate tonight.)

We had crab cakes and corn cakes and a lovely dip for appetizers, green beans, two salads and two desserts: pumpkin and lemon meringue pies!  We eat good on Pokeno Night!

Enjoy!