Sauteed Chicken Breast Cutlets in Lemon Sauce with Prosciutto & Sage

This meal is super easy and super tasty. I got the recipe from, who else? Cook's Illustrated. I subscribe to their website so have access to a lot, but not all, of their recipes and product/food reviews. Found this while surfing last week.

So here's the skinny: 4 chicken breasts or 6-8 chicken tenderloins (these days I prefer tenderloins), salt and pepper and put in fridge for a few hours in italian dressing (generic is fine). When ready, dredge in flour and melt equal amounts butter/olive oil (1.5 TBS) in pan over high heat. When the foam slows down and starts to turn color, turn to medium/high and put the chicken in the pan and brown on both sides (about 4 minutes per side). The browned butter will give a fabulous nutty flavor. Be sure these are nicely browned (not cream colored) - brown = flavor! NEXT: the sauce (do not clean the pan! Put the chicken on a plate/cover loosely with foil and put in a 200 degree oven while making the sauce).

Sauce Ingredients: 1 cup chicken broth, two cloves garlic (sliced thin), 15 leaves fresh sage, 2 TBS fresh lemon juice, 3 TBS softened butter and slice of proscuitto diced (don't go too heavy on this: salty!!)

 In the same pan over medium heat: saute the garlic and sage for about a minute or so - until the garlic is juuuust turning color and the sage is a little crispy. BE CAREFUL: Garlic will turn and burn faster than you can say "turn and burn."

Sage and garlic in browned butter and chicken 'bits'

Add the two tablespoons of fresh lemon juice (about 1 lemon. Please oh please, if you have one of those plastic lemon juice things in your fridge: throw that thing out!) Scrape up the brown bits with a silicone or wooden spoon. Add the chicken broth. Turn heat up a bit and bring to a boil. Cook until reduced to about 1/4 cup (abouuut 8 minutes). Keep a good eye on it but you can....

...check on the dog:

  

 Once the sauce is reduced to about 1/4 cup, take off the heat and stir in the butter and prosciutto. Now taste the sauce. Does it need anything? Salt? Pepper? Be careful because that prosciutto will taste super salty. 

Pull chicken from the oven, pour sauce over. Enjoy!

I loved this. Would be amazing even without the sage/prosciutto - the sauce had a wonderful toasty buttery lemony flavor going on. Fabulous! We kept it simple and served it with salad.

Bon appetit!