10/10/10 - Chicken Piccata!

One issue we have with LA that we believe we have mentioned is the lack of good Italian food at a reasonable price. So, we have taught ourselves to make some of our basic favorites. Tonight we take on the chicken piccata. Our version is very close to a chicken francese

The Wine Kitty recommends the Zaca Mesa '07 Z Blanc to go with the chicken dish. While Zaca Mesa is mostly known for their delicious Syrahs, this is a buttery, oaky, golden white drinks like a high-end Napa chardonnay but is a blend of 74% Roussane, 22% Grenache & 4% Viognier. You can only get this wine at their winery or through their online store. It retails for about $32 ($29 if you are a member of ZM's wine club).

Chicken Piccata


2 large skinless boneless chicken breast halves
2 Tbsp butter, room temperature
1 tablespoon all purpose flour
2 tablespoons olive oil
¼ cup dry white wine
¼ cup chicken stock
¼ cup fresh lemon juice
2 Tbsp drained capers
¼ cup chopped fresh parsley
Salt/pepper

Place chicken between 2 large sheets of plastic wrap. Lightly pound chicken to 1/2-inch thickness. Salt and pepper chicken pieces. Coat each chicken piece in flour.

Heat 1 Tbsp oil and 1 Tbsp butter in a large skillet. Add chicken and cook until golden and cooked completely, about 3 minutes per side.

Transfer chicken to plate and keep warm.

Mix 1 Tbsp butter and 1 Tbps flour in small bowl until smooth. Bring wine, stock and lemon juice to boil in skillet over medium-high heat. Whisk in butter-flour mixture and stir for a minute until sauce thickens. Stir in capers and parsley. Season to taste. Pour sauce over chicken and serve or toss chicken in pan with sauce and serve.

We paired the piccata with our grilled romaine leaves. If you are carving some carbs, you can also whip up a side of spaghetti or penne and use the extra lemon butter sauce on the pasta.

Sunday, May 2: Vivere Vongole!

One of Laura's favorite dishes to order in an Italian restaurant (coming in third behind pizza and veal piccata) is linguine con volgole: linguine with clams in white sauce. 


Making the dish at home turns out to be surprisingly easy. The one catch is you need to run out to the store and buy a few pounds of fresh clams (go for the littlest ones). Clams don't keep well or freeze well so you need to use them within a day of buying them. In other words, Mike learned the hard way to not buy the super bag of these at Costco. Go to your local fish market. We like Santa Monica Seafood.

You don't always have to make your own pasta. This is Mike's makeshift pasta rack, a plastic coat hanger.  If you don't feel like making your own, packaged pasta will work OK for this dish, but get something as close to fresh as possible like Buitoni.

Probably the best & easiest pairing with this entree is a simple green salad. We never use store bought dressings. We picked up a bunch of "living lettuce" that is still attached to the root bulb. It's supposed to stay fresher in the refrigerator longer, and, since it's usually difficult to get Laura to eat salad, that's a good thing.

Our butter lettuce salad has sliced tomato, carrots, radishes & avocado. We drizzled with a blood orange flavored olive oil, white balsamic vinegar, salt & pepper. Served in one of the purple pyrex bowls Laura scavenged off eBay. The purple is discontinued, but as anyone who has lived with Laura knows, the more purple the better!

The Wine Kitty recommends....


A Pinot Grigio to go with the vongole we're about to prepare. Normally Laura doesn't like Pinot Grigio because most cheap ones taste like drinking perfume. According to Food & Wine magazine, the Santa Margherita we picked up from our local Ralph's supermarket for $25 is the most popular Italian pinot grigio sold in the U.S. While this wine still has a very fragrant smell, it tastes clean, a bit dry and light, and ever so slightly of apples. This is one white that tastes even better and more refreshing when it's very cold.


LINGUINE CON VONGOLE

3 tbsp. butter

1 garlic clove, thinly sliced 

2 pounds small clams (usually cherrystone or littleneck), scrubbed clean

1/3 cup chicken broth, homemade or low-sodium canned 

1/3 cup dry white wine (we use 2 Buck Chuck Chardonnay from Trader Joe's)
1 teaspoon dried hot red pepper flakes 

2 plum tomatoes, diced & de-seeded

14 ounces dried thin linguine 

1/4 cup chopped fresh Italian parsley leaves 

Heat 3 tablespoons butter in a deep 12-inch heavy skillet over moderately high heat until hot but not smoking, then saute garlic for about 1 minute..
Stir in clams, broth, wine, and chiles and boil, covered until clams open, about 4 to 5 minutes (discard any clams that do not open after 6 minutes). If using whole chiles, remove with a slotted spoon and discard.
While clams are cooking, cook pasta half way. Drain in a colander, then add to clams and simmer, stirring, until pasta is fully cooked.
Toss with parsley and and diced tomato, and serve immediately.

You might also want to have a fresh, crusty loaf of Italian bread handy to soak up any of the sauce that's left in the bottom of the bowl!