It is such a well-known dish, there is almost no need for a recipe. You can use different fillings for the rolled chicken, such as half-cooked rice, diced vegetables, any type of deli style meat product or only spinach. The preparation process is always the same: using the meat mallet, flatten the breast as thin as possible to roll it out easily. While doing this, I use a small bag to keep my kitchen clean. However you can buy them ready from your butcher if he does not mind flattening them for you.
You need half a breast per person, enough spinach leaves to cover the breasts and very thinly sliced jambon. The cheese stick is gruyere here but you can choose any type of hard cheese. Just lay the breast down, salt and pepper it, cover with a couple of spinach leaves. Do not forget to sprinkle with ground nutmeg, it is the best friend of spinach! Lay one slice of jambon over the leaves and put the cheese stick at the wide end of the breast.
Before rolling the chicken, pour cornmeal in a plate, breadcrumbs in another and brake two eggs in a third one. Sprinkle the egg with some blackpepper and salt, mix well. Roll the breast tightly and tuck the sides closely inside. Holding firmly, dip it in the cornmeal first, roll to cover throughly, do not forget to dip the narrow ends. Then dip in the egg mixture and cover completely. Finely roll it in breadcrumbs and set aside. After finishing with all the pieces, put them in the fridge, uncovered, for at least half an hour to harden and drying-up. You can prepare them ahead and keep refrigerated all day.
30 mins before serving, heat the oven at 200C degrees. Put a little olive oil in a non-stick pan and fry rolls on all sides until golden. Place a wire rack on your tray and put the fried rolls on it. Juices will be dripping, so you can add a little water in the tray just to make the clean-up easier.
Bake them, in preheated oven for 10 minutes to cook throughly. Do not keep them overtime in the oven, the cheese would melt away and may spill out by the heat. Remove from the oven and serve immediately. Leftovers (if you would have any!) would make good sandwiches, sliced thinly and accompanied by mustard and some lettuce leaves. Enjoy!
It has been ages since the last time I posted a recipe. Unfortunately some health problems in the family and lack of time does not allow me to blog more often. I am hoping this situation to change soon. Today I want to share a very succesfull panettone recipe, though it is also out of season now. But better late than never....as they say.
The recipe is from allrecipes.com and I baked it many times past holiday season. You can prepare it completely in your bread machine if you wish. Actually the recipe has been given for this purpose only. But I prefer to prepare only the dough in the breadmaker, then give it a second rise, then cook in the oven. This way the dough matures bu raising twice and becomes softer, bigger and in my opinion; tastier. I used special panettone forms which were made of greaseproof paper. You can get them from speciality stores.
- 1/4 cup butter
- 2 eggs
- 1 sachet vanilla
- 3.5 cups bread flour
- 4-5 tablespoons sugar
- 2 tablespoons milk powder
- 1.5 teaspoons salt
- 2 teaspoons instant yeast
- 1/2 cup mixed dried fruits
Place the ingredients in your breadmaker according to the manifacturer's instructions. If you intend to leave the whole process to the machine, choose the basic bread cycle and add the fruit pieces when the machine beeps at the end of the first hour.
If you want to use your oven, choose the dough cycle and add the fruits 2-3 minutes before the machine stops mixing. Take out the raised dough and shape a ball on a floured surface. Place the ball in the panettone form and leave to rise in a warm place. Bake in preheated oven at 180-200 C for about 45 minutes. Leave to cool ona wire rack. You can sift powdered sugar on top.
This bread tastes even better the next day, reheated in your toaster, buttered and sprinkled with a little marmelade.... enjoy
