Chicken and Broccoli with a Twist!

I love cookbooks. I constantly peruse them at the store, impulsively buy them, or add them to my Christmas list. As of now, I have about 20. Even though I have used (on average) 0.8 recipes from each, I still want more! I found last night's recipes from Giada's Everyday Italian and Ina Garten's Barefoot Contessa: Back to Basics. It is a simple meal, easy to make, and turns out beautifully! These two recipes are easy to make together because some ingredients overlap. I have taken some liberties with these recipes to make them for 2 people/easier to follow/post. Here it is below:


Giada's Chicken Saltimbocca 
(Fun fact: "saltimbocca" means "leap in the mouth"- aka the food will jump into your mouth!)


Ingredients

• 1 (10-ounce) box frozen spinach
• 3 tablespoons of olive oil
• Salt
• Freshly ground black pepper
• 6 chicken cutlets (see below!)
• 6 paper-thin slices of prosciutto
• 1/4 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
• 1 14-ounce can reduced-sodium chicken broth (I just used bouillon because it's cheaper and takes forever to go bad)
• 3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice (from 1 lemon)

1. Thaw the spinach by putting it in the microwave for about 2 minutes. Once it is thawed, squeeze the extra water out.

2. In a small bowl, toss the spinach with 1 tablespoon olive oil to coat, season with salt and pepper.

3. Prepare the chicken cutlets. This shows how the chicken should be cut. I went to my butcher, bought 2 chicken breasts, and asked him to filet them open. You can easily do this with chicken breasts at home. Once they are open, you can pound them thinner with any heavy object (be sure to cover the chicken with plastic wrap to prevent the germs from spreading!). The thinner you make each cutlet, the easier it will be to roll them up.

4. Place the chicken on a flat work surface and season with S&P. Layer each cutlet with 1 slice of prosciutto, an even layer of spinach, and top with some of the cheese.

5. Beginning at the tapered end of the cutlet, roll each piece as for a jelly roll and secure with a toothpick. Maybe it's just me, but I don't know what a "jelly roll" is. Sooooo, basically, make it look like a fat burrito. 

6. In a large skillet, heat some olive oil over high. This will make the browning easier. Add the chicken rolls and cook each side until brown, about 2 minutes. This pic is before they have been turned once, aka, why they are still raw. 

8. Once all sides are browned, add the chicken broth and lemon juice to the skillet. As you can see in my picture, I didn't brown each side enough. I just sort of "cooked" each side. They required more cooking once I thought I was finished and it was a huge pain! So make yours look like the top 2 pieces of chicken.

9. Reduce the heat to medium, cover and simmer until the chicken is cooked through, about 4 minutes. I don't have a lid for this skillet so I just covered it with foil.

10. Once cooking is complete, transfer the chicken to a plate. You can reduce the sauce and use it to top the chicken if you'd like, I opted not to because we were starving at this point. See below for entire meal picture!

Parmesan-Roasted Broccoli

Ingredients

• 1-2 pounds of broccoli (I used 1 head because it was just the two of us, you could easily eat 1 head/person!)
• Garlic (1-2 cloves per each head of broccoli, depending on how much you like garlic)
• A few leaves of basil
• Olive Oil
• Salt and Pepper
• Grated Lemon Zest (when you zest a lemon, you just want the colored part of the peel, stop when you get to the white)
• 1-2 tablespoons lemon juice (again, depending on how much you like lemon flavor)
• 3 tablespoons pine nuts (I could not find pine nuts at my grocery so I used sunflower seeds, it worked well!)
• 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese

1. Preheat the oven to 425.

2. Cut the broccoli florets from the thick stalks, leaving an inch or so of stalk attached to the florets. (PS: a "floret" is the bunchy part on top) Cut the larger pieces through the base of the floret tops and pull apart. This just makes for easier roasting and eating.

3. Chop the garlic and basil. Even if you know how to chop, I think you'll be fine not having a picture of the basil... especially because I don't have a pic =)

4. Place the broccoli florets on a sheet pan or in a pyrex. Spread them out so they are in a single layer. Drizzle with enough olive oil to coat and toss with the garlic. I scooted the mix all to one side so the flavors would mix better. Place in the oven for 20-25 minutes.

6. While the broccoli is in the oven, combine the lemon zest, lemon juice, and some olive oil in a small bowl.

7. While broccoli is still cooking, roast the pine nuts/sunflower seeds. Whenever you roast seeds or nuts, just place them in a dry skillet, single-layer, over medium heat. Once you can smell the natural aroma, they are finished. Be careful because they burn easily!

8. The broccoli is done in the oven when it is crisp-tender and some of the floret heads are browned. When it is finished cooking, immediately toss with lemon juice mixture, nuts/seeds, cheese and chopped basil.

This broccoli turned out amazing! I will definitely be making it again. 

Enjoy!