Chicken paillard with tomato and zucchini sauce, broad beans and basil
A paillard is in essence an escalope that has been flattened with a kitchen mallet. The pouding breaks down the fibres of the meat and tenderises it. The resulting piece of meat is thin but remains moist as it cooks quickly without much caramelisation. This summer why not give Serge Dansereau’s delicious chicken paillard a go from his most recent cookbook ‘Seasonal Kitchen’.
Ingredients
2 x 160g chicken breasts
80ml olive oil
1 onion, finely chopped
2 garlic cloves, chopped
125ml white wine
8 Roma tomatoes, peeledand diced
12 baby zucchini with flowers,cut into 2 lengthways, flowersreserved
1 bunch basil, chopped
90g broad beans, blanched and peeled
How?
[list style=”number”][list_item]Butterfly the thickest part of each chicken breast. Lay some plastic wrap on cutting board, drizzle with a little oil and set the chicken breasts on top. Drizzlea few more drops of oil on top of the breast and cover with plastic wrap. Usinga kitchen mallet or a rolling pin, pound so you have a thin, flat breast of aneven thickness.[/list_item][list_item]Cook the onion, garlic and white wine in a medium saucepan over medium heat for 10 minutes. Add the tomatoes, zucchini and basil. Season and cook untilthe zucchini are tender, about 5 minutes.[/list_item][list_item]Heat the olive oil in a large frying pan over a medium heat. Season the chicken breasts, sear on both sides and cook for about 1 minute. (You do not need to givethem much colour.) Warm up the tomato and zucchini sauce, add the broad beans, basil and zucchini flowers and toss gently.[/list_item][list_item]To serve, spoon half the sauce on a platter, place the breasts on top and spoonon the rest of the sauce.[/list_item][/list]
