Chicken 'Saltimbocca' with Emmentaler and Lemon

'Chicken breasts' is one of the most frequent keyword searches that lead to this blog, and I suppose that's because people are always on the lookout for quick, easy recipes using this family staple. Here's a dish I love, similar to saltimbocca (an Italian contraction meaning 'it jumps in one's mouth'), but in place of veal I use deboned chicken breasts, and I deglaze the pan with a little lemon juice instead of the traditional marsala.

The idea for sticking some cheese between the Parma ham and the chicken comes from one of Jamie Oliver's programmes (one of his Food Revolution series, I think), and what a good idea it is, although you can leave out if you're counting calories (not that this will make much difference: this is a dish laden with butter).

The lemon slice, as it caramelises in the pan, imparts a lovely zesty perfume to the dish.  I always tie the lemon slice and sage leaves on with raffia or string, because the thought of a sharp toothpick in a meal a child's going to be eating gives me the creeps.

Don't let the butter get too brown in the pan, or the sauce will have a burned taste. Serve with a pile of fluffy parsleyed mash.

(By the way, chicken breasts on the bone are considerably cheaper than ready-prepared ones. Skinning them and whipping out the bone takes seconds, and saves you a lot of money.)

Chicken 'Saltimbocca' with Emmentaler and Lemon
4 skinned, deboned chicken breasts
eight thin slices of Emmentaler, or similar
4 slices of Parma ham
two thin slices of lemon, halved
16 small fresh sage leaves
1 T (15 ml) olive oil
3 T (45 ml) butter
the juice of small lemon
milled black pepper

Put the chicken breasts between two sheets of clingfilm or baking paper and, using a rolling pin, gently flatten them so that they're of an even thickness. Cover each breast with two slices of cheese, and then a slice of ham. Place the lemon slices and sage leaves, as shown above, on the top, and secure with a piece of kitchen string or a strand of raffia.  Press down firmly on the top of the breast with the palm of your hand.

Heat the olive oil in a large non-stick frying pan. Add the breasts, lemon-slice down, and fry over a brisk heat for two minutes. Flip the breasts over, and fry the other side for another two to three minutes, or until the breast is cooked right through. Add the butter to the pan a minute before the breasts are ready, and use it to baste the tops of the breasts. Season with black pepper (you shouldn't need to add any extra salt). Remove the breasts and place on a warm platter.  Turn up the heat slightly and add the lemon juice, swirling to release any bits of golden sediment. Allow to bubble for a minute, and then pour the sauce over the breasts.

Serve immediately, with mashed potato.

Serves 4

Print Friendly

Ricotta-and-Parsley-Filled Paccheri Baked with a Tomato, Butter and Sage Sauce

The defining deliciousness of this sunny baked pasta dish comes from a sauce made from just a few ingredients: burstingly ripe cherry tomatoes cooked to a stickiness in hot butter, then lightly mashed with a whisper of garlic, a few shredded fresh sage leaves and a splash of cream.

Ricotta-and-Parsley-Filled Paccheri Baked with a Tomato, Butter and Sage Sauce

The sauce is simplicity itself, but the pasta part of this dish - big tubes stuffed with a mixture of ricotta, parsley, egg and nutmeg - is a bit fiddly to make, and will take you a good half-hour to prepare.

If you're up to spending that much time stuffing a pasta tube, and you think life is long enough to do so, put on some good music and pour yourself a glass of wine.

If you don't have the time to spare, make the sauce - in double the quantity - tip it over a bowl of freshly cooked fettuccine, and top with fresh rocket and grated Parmesan.

I devised this dish because my family are getting a bit sick of the old pasta standbyes, namely spag bol, pasta-and-pesto and fettuccine Alfredo.

It's very similar to that classic Italian dish of cannelloni filled with ricotta and spinach, except that I used paccheri - large, hollow pasta tubes - instead of cannelloni, and parsley instead of spinach.

I am a great fan of flat-leaf parsley, and think it deserves to be treated as an actual vegetable, rather than a last-minute garnishing flourish, or as a humdrum stock ingredient.

You might think it odd that the uncooked pasta tubes are placed upright in the dish before they're baked, but I've done so to prevent the filling from squidging out while the dish sits, soaking in a cup of water, for an hour before baking.

If you can't find big pasta tubes, use cannelloni instead. And, as always, please use the best ingredients: really ripe, sweet cherry tomatoes, fresh garlic, crisp parsley and good butter.

---

Ricotta & Parsley Filled Paccheri with a Tomato Butter Sauce

1 bag (500 g) paccheri, or giant pasta tubes

For the stuffing:
2 Tbsp (30 ml) oil
1 Tbsp (15 ml) butter
1 medium onion, peeled and very finely chopped
1 cup (250 ml) finely chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley (about 70 g)
1 Tbsp (15 ml) fresh lemon juice
400 g ricotta cheese, crumbled
2 medium eggs
quarter of a whole nutmeg, finely grated
flaky sea salt
milled black pepper
about 4 Tbsp (60 ml) pouring cream
1½ cups (375 ml) hot water

For the sauce:
800 g ripe cherry tomatoes
80 g butter
1 Tbsp (15 ml) olive oil
2 cloves fresh garlic, peeled and finely chopped
6 sage leaves, finely shredded
4 Tbsp (60 ml) pouring cream
flaky sea salt
milled black pepper

To top:
½ cup (125 ml) grated Parmesan

First make the stuffing. Heat the oil and butter in a frying pan, and add the finely chopped onion. Fry, over a medium heat, for three minutes or so, or until the onion has softened, and is beginning to turn golden. Do not allow to brown. Turn down the heat, add the chopped parsley, stir well so that it is coated, and cook very gently for another minute. Remove from the heat and tip the mixture into a bowl. Add the lemon juice, ricotta, eggs and nutmeg, and stir well to combine. Season with salt and pepper. Now add just enough cream to turn the mixture into a slack paste that can be easily squeezed through a piping bag.

Generously butter a deep ceramic or glass baking dish big enough to hold all the pasta tubes upright (note: the pictures in this blog were made with a half-quantity of this recipe, so you'll need a dish double the size). Put the filling into a piping bag fitted with a medium nozzle, and squeeze a little filling into each pasta tube.

The best way to do this is to place each tube upright on a chopping board, and to fill it from the top (no need to fill each tube to the brim: three-quarters full is fine). Place the filled tubes upright in the dish, leaning them against each other until the dish is full. If you run out of stuffing before the dish is full, put a few empty pasta tubes between the full ones so that the dish is fairly tightly packed. Pour a cup of hot water into a jug with a pouring nozzle, and trickle the water down the side of the ceramic dish, so that the bottoms of the tubes are standing in water. Set to one side while you make the sauce.

To make the sauce, cut a small slash in each cherry tomato. Heat the butter and olive oil in a large, flat pan. When the butter stops foaming, add the tomatoes and cook, over a brisk heat, tossing often, for 7 to 10 minutes, or until the tomatoes begin to brown and a sticky golden residue forms on the bottom of the pan.

Add the garlic and shredded sage, and use a potato masher to lightly crush the tomatoes and release the juices. Turn down the heat and simmer very gently for another 10 minutes, crushing down on the tomatoes now and again, until you have a thick, chunky sauce. Stir in the cream and season to taste with salt and pepper.

Remove the sauce from the heat and pour it evenly over the top of the pasta tubes, without stirring. Give the dish a gentle shake, cover with clingfilm [saran wrap] and allow to stand for an hour.

In the meantime, heat the oven to 170 ºC. Remove the clingfilm from the dish and sprinkle the grated Parmesan evenly over the top. Place in the oven and bake for 35-45 minutes, or until the pasta is cooked through, and the sauce is bubbling vigorously.

Serve with fresh rocket or mixed greens.

Serves 8. Print Friendly

Roast Pork Neck with Leeks, Carrots and Apples

Roast Pork Neck with Leeks, Carrots and Apples

Pork neck is an inexpensive yet most tender cut, with a delicate, sweet taste that lends itself to all sorts of flavour combinations. I don't know why you can't buy pork neck (or pork belly, for that matter) in your average South African supermarket: I suppose because the words 'pork' and 'neck' put together just sound tough and brutish, like 'knuckle gristle' or 'elbow grind'.

If you have a good butcher - I buy my pork from the incomparable Seemann's, in Strydom Park, Johannesburg - ask him for this cut. It's excellent in stews and casseroles, and lovely roasted in the oven with garlic, olive oil and fresh herbs. It also lends itself well to dark, spicy Oriental glazes: try coating a piece of pork neck in a mixture of soy sauce , honey, rice wine and orange juice wine flavoured with ginger, garlic and five-spice powder, and baking it at a low temperature for three or four hours until it's so tender you can shred it with a fork.

In this recipe, the pork is slow-cooked (after a preliminary hot-firing for browning purposes) on a bed of carrots, leeks and onions, with apple wedges and fresh sage adding sweetness and punch.

Roast Pork Neck with Leeks, Carrots and Apples

For the roast:
a piece of pork neck (about 1.3 kg), trimmed of large bits of fat
2 Tbsp (30 ml) wholegrain mustard
2 Tbsp (30 ml) olive oil
salt and freshly milled pepper
3 cloves fresh garlic, peeled and sliced
a large sprigs of fresh sage

For the vegetables:
8 big carrots, peeled
8 leeks, white parts only, rinsed
2 onions, peeled
2 Tbsp (30 ml) olive oil
1 Tbsp (15 ml) butter
3 eating apples (I used Golden Delicious)
3 cloves fresh garlic, roughly chopped
1 Tbsp (15ml) fresh thyme (see note below)
2 Tbsp (30ml) fresh sage leaves, sliced
1½ cups (375 ml) chicken, beef or vegetable stock or a combination of stock and dry white wine
salt and milled black pepper

For the gravy:
4 tsp (20ml) flour
2 cups stock, or a combination of stock and white wine
a dash of Kikkoman soy sauce (optional)
salt and milled black pepper

Preheat the oven to 220°C. Place the pork neck in a roasting pan and smear the mustard all over it. Sprinkle with olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Tuck the garlic slices and sage sprig under the pork and place in the oven, on the top rack. Roast for 35-45 minutes, or until the pork is beginning to turn a golden brown on top. Remove from the oven and drain off any excess fat.

In the meantime, prepare the vegetables. Top and tail the peeled carrots and cut into batons as long and thick as your ring finger. Cut the leeks into 2-cm slices, and quarter the onions. Heat the olive oil and butter in a big pan or wok and add the carrots, leeks and onions. Cook, stirring frequently, over a high heat for five minutes, or until the leeks and onions begin to take on a little colour. Core the apples and cut into wedges, but do not peel. Now add the apple to the pan along with the garlic, the thyme, and the sage.

Cook, tossing frequently, for another three minutes, then season with salt and pepper.

Remove the pork neck from its pan and put it aside. Spread the vegetables and apple in the roasting pan and set the pork neck on top. Pour in the stock and/or white wine. Put the pan back in the oven and reduce the heat to 150° C. Bake, uncovered, for about an hour and a half, or until the vegetables are soft and glazed and the pork is meltingly tender. Check the dish every half hour or so: if the stock has boiled away, add a little more. By the time it's finished cooking, there should be just a few tablespoons of liquid left in the pan.

Remove the pork and set aside to rest for ten minutes. Lift the vegetables from the roasting pan - leaving a few bits of carrot, leek, onion and garlic behind - using a slotted spoon, and keep warm. Put the roasting pan on the hob and turn the heat onto high. Sprinkle the flour into the pan and stir well, scraping to dislodge any golden residue. Cook for two or so minutes, pressing on the remaining veg bits with the back of a spoon. Now pour in a cup of stock or stock/wine combination, and, using a whisk, stir vigorously until the sauce thickens and bubbles alarmingly. Thin the gravy with more stock, water or wine to the desired consistency (I know it's old-fashioned, but I like a thickish gravy). Turn down the heat to very low and and allow to bubble gently for five minutes. If the gravy seems a bit pallid, add a dash of soy sauce.

Carve the pork into thickish slices and serve with the vegetables and gravy.

Serves 6.

Note:
You really do need fresh thyme and sage for this dish. My thyme bush is so poorly that I have taken to buying fresh bunches of thyme and freezing them, still in their packets. When a recipe calls for thyme, I open the packet, and scrunch it in my hands over the pan, so that the little frozen leaves shower out, leaving the stalks behind. And there is no loss of flavour or texture at all. Print Friendly