Chicken and beyond

Earlier this month, R and I had a chance to dine at one of our fave restaurants, Maggiano's for a rehearsal dinner. We had some lovely apps, followed by a family-style servings of chopped salad and caesar salad, gnocci with a tomato vodka sauce, chicken saltimbocca, roasted pork, chicken with veggies and farfalle, and for dessert, chocolate zuccotto and a delicious apple crostada. It was super delish, and super filling, obviously.

R lurved the chicken saltimbocca, so I set about to replicate it at home. Basically, I pounded out chicken, seasoned with salt, pepper, and an Italian seasoning mix (was out of sage, and was v. po'd about it) and then layered on some prosciutto and a sprinkling of parm. Rolled it up, pinned it with some toothpicks, and then browned it in a pan and baked until done. I then made a bit of a sauce using the brown bits in the pan, a splash of wine, chicken broth, lemon juice, and butter.

To go along with the chicken, I made an Everyday Food recipe, Mushroom Ragout with Pasta. I didn't use quite that many mushrooms, mainly b/c I didn't feel like buying that many mushrooms, and I subbed in some tomato balsamic vinegar for the red wine vinegar (because I had it on hand, from the fab Oil & Vinegar store). It was pretty tasty, and R loooved it. I'm not sure that I'd build the sauce with just tomato paste the next time, but then, I guess it simply becomes a basic mushroom sauce. Hmm. Anyways, I would recommend it for mushroom people.