Monday, July 12, 2010

Crispy Yogurt Chicken

I am actually blogging about the meal I am still digesting!!!!

I have been cleaning up a storm today and finally got to the pantry. My pantry is a black hole of canned goods, pasta and various other ingredients that you could whip up many fine meals from. If we ever get stuck in the house we could easily live off all that food for a few months. I expected the show hoarders to come knocking on my door and need to have a sit down about the 7 boxes of Orzo sitting on my shelf. Let's not even get into the 5 cans of Pumpkin Puree. After 3 garbage bags and a huge pile of empty cans, it is now cleaned out and up to date. Now that it is clean I can see if I have the ingredients I need instead of just being lazy and buying what I need each week. When I see the huge pantries some people have in their houses, my heart starts to beat faster and I just start daydreaming about all the things I could fill them with. Maybe someday............

The Pioneer Women is a celebrity in the world of food blogging. She has written a book, she has a really entertaining blog and manages to cook too! I can handle 1 out of 3....something 2-
This is one of her recipes and I did change it up a bit but its the kind of recipe that allows for it.

Crispy Yogurt Chicken

Ingredients

  • 1 cups Plain, Unflavored Yogurt
  • 2 cloves (to 3 Cloves) Garlic
  • Parsley, To Taste (I used about a handful of leaves, maybe 3 tbs. in all)
  • 1 whole (juice Of) Lemon
  • Chicken breasts (thighs or legs are her preferred method)
  • Salt To Taste
  • 2 cups Panko Bread Crumbs
  • Butter (1 Pat For Each Piece Of Chicken)

Preparation Instructions

I used my mini-chopper and threw in the garlic, the juice of a whole lemon, and the parsley. I pulsed it a few times. Then added in the yogurt and pulsed it a few more times. Then I poured that mixture into a shallow dish.

Rinse chicken and pat it dry. Sprinkle with (kosher) salt.


In another bowl, place the bread crumbs. Sprinkle with salt and stir lightly.


Butter a baking dish. With a pair of tongs, place the chicken, one piece at a time into the yogurt mixture. Turn it over thoroughly to coat. Then roll the chicken in the Panko bread crumbs. Cover each piece thoroughly with bread crumbs and place in the baking dish.


Place a slice of butter over the large part of each chicken piece. Cover with foil and bake in a 350ยบ oven for 1 to 1 ¼ hours, removing the foil for the last 15 minutes of cooking (it might take a little longer). When the chicken is nice and golden, remove from the oven and enjoy!


VERDICT--This chicken was so delicious it made me clean my pantry!!!! It was so juicy, it had such great flavor, it was really easy and I will be making it again very soon. The original recipe was for 2 cups of yogurt but there was so much left when I was done, I changed my version to reflect just 1 cup of yogurt. I think it will bump up the flavor too, which was good but I bet its even better next time.. I am going to make sure I always have what I need to make this chicken in a pinch because it is now my go-to recipe!


5 comments:

  1. This sounds great. I've never used yogurt to bread chicken before. I like the flavors in the yogurt mixture.

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  2. You are right in that it is great to have ingredients on hand for go-to recipes like this one. I am going to give your version a try this week.

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  3. I made this tonight and it got thumbs up all the way around (including from the MIL). I thought it was a little salty but I think i might have over done salting the chicken. I'm used to very little salt so I might skip that next time.

    Also, I accidentally used two cups of yogurt so I had a bunch left over just like you said. I served it with mashed potatoes and as I was mixing them up I realized I could have divided the yogurt mixture and used the rest in the potatoes.

    I will definitely be making this again.

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  4. I made this tonight with mashed potatoes and steam-in-bag green beans and it got thumbs up all the way around the table (including from my MIL!). I thought it was a bit salty but I'm used to things with very little salt. I think I might have overdone salting the chicken so I'll probably skip that set next time and I'm sure it will be a bit closer to the saltiness I'm used to.

    Also, I accidentally used two cups of yogurt so I had a bunch extra just like you did. I realized a bit too late that I could have divided the yogurt mixture and used half for the chicken and the other half for the potatoes. Maybe next time I'll use two cups of yogurt on purpose and do just that.

    Thanks for this great recipe and for most of all helping me answer the question "what the heck am I going to feed MIL?" :-)

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  5. Always happy to keep the MIL's of the world easily fed.
    This was such a find and I keep it in the rotation for something different to do with chicken
    glas you enjoyed

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