My favorite dish to cook by far,
awesome tasting and easily done. Here's how to impress
friends,
family,
loved-ones, and enjoy a self-cooked yummy dinner that takes less than half an hour from start to finish:
First, go out and get yourself a package (or two) of some nice, thin-sliced (or not if you really know how to slice them correctly)
chicken cutlets. I prefer
buying meat from a butcher as the end product is always more
flavorful, but whatever you can get your hands on depending on your timeframe is fine. Below is a list of some other
stuff you may have at
home, or should pick before starting:
Tomato Sauce (your preference, I make my own)
Bread Crumbs (flavored or not, also your call)
Large
Eggs (at least 2 per package of chicken)
Milk (anything other than
skim/
fat-free is fine)
Vegetable or
Corn Oil (you don't need much really)
Mozzarella Cheese (I like to get it sliced thin, but it's up to you)
Salt
Pepper (black)
OK, now we have our
ingredients, let's do this....
First, let's get a bowl large enough to hold our cutlets in, and crack a couple eggs in the bowl. Next lets add a couple tablespoons of milk to the bowl of eggs, some salt and pepper, and beat until
consistent (less than a minute).
Good job! Next let's throw our cutlets in there and let them sit for a while in the egg. Meanwhile grab a
shallow dish (or bowl) and add some breadcrumbs. Just so we're clear , the
object here is to eventually coat the chicken with the breadcrumbs, and finally fry them quickly.
Let's take a cutlet, let the excess egg drip off of it and (figure this out yourself) coat it with the breadcrumbs (in the bowl/dish you chose). Have a plate handy to temporarily store these cutlets. Are you done with that yet?!
Ok, now here's the
clincher: Take a
frying pan and add a little bit of oil (enough to make about 1/4 inch puddle) to the pan. Let's heat the pan up on medium, and wait a minute or so until it gets
nice and hot.
Once the pan is hot, let's brown the sides of the cutlets, and drain them on paper towel. the *
trick* here is to not *
overcook* the cutlets, just letting them get brown and crispy on the outside. While your doing this throw on your
oven to about 350/375 . Your going to want to let the cutlets drain for a bit on both sides (as your not trying to
consume all that oil).
Ok, now we have our cultlets drained and
fried, our oven is hot, so we will finalize the process. On a shallow baking pan or
Pyrex dish, let's place our cutlets, leaving a little room between them. Throw the dish in the oven, and let them cook for about 10 minutes @ 350/375. This will ensure our
meat is cooked, but not
overdone. Meanwhile, why not start boiling some water to make some
pasta as a
side-dish (you can boil water, can't you?).
Next we're going to open the oven, evenly put some
sauce on the cutlets, and let them cook for another minute or two (to let the sauce heat up on em). Finally let's open the oven one more time (we're about 12-15 minutes into this), and spread the
mozzarella over the cutlets. Close the oven back up (with the cutlets inside, of course), and let them cook for another couple minutes, or until the
cheese is nice and
melted. Remove the dish from the oven, and serve on a
plate with some pasta, and maybe a little
garlic bread and maybe some
home-made sauce.