Lemon Balsamic-Dijon Chicken Breasts with a Rosemary Olive Oil Crust

This recipe is great for weeknights for two reasons: (1) you don’t need to marinate the chicken hours ahead of time, and (2) there are very few ingredients; sometimes you don’t always have fresh herbs and produce on hand.  However, you can still achieve wonderful flavors by taking advantage of our rosemary infused olive oil and tangy Sicilian lemon balsamic vinegar. To top it all off, we lowered the fat in this dish by baking it in the oven and using Dijon mustard and balsamic vinegar as the base coating instead of the usual egg and flour.  Extra flavor with less fat, perfect! In fact there’s another reason why this makes for a great mid-week dinner; you don’t need to hover over the stove top. Once it’s in the oven you have a good ½ hour to prepare your side dishes and set the table. Rosemary Olive Oil and Sicilian lemon balsamic are the perfect pair to always have on hand in the kitchen!

INGREDIENTS

• 2 large boneless, skinless whole chicken breasts
• 1½ cups panko (Japanese-style bread crumbs)
• 2 tablespoons Olive This! Rosemary Olive Oil 
• 1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• ½ cup Dijon mustard
• 3 tablespoons Olive This! Sicilian Lemon Balsamic Vinegar
• salt

DIRECTIONS

Adjust the oven rack to the middle position and preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Spray a large rimmed baking sheet with cooking spray or brush with olive oil. Our photographs at the end of the recipe show our baking pan lined with foil. The foil got in the way when transferring the cooked chicken to the serving platter so ditch the foil; the clean up wasn’t that bad. Set baking pan aside.

Pat chicken breasts dry with a paper towel. Slice each breast in half lengthwise as shown. Salt both sides of each half.

In a shallow dish, combine the 1½ cups of panko bread crumbs, 1 teaspoon of fresh black pepper and the 2 tablespoons of rosemary infused olive oil. Mix well to evenly coat the panko.

In a small bowl, stir the ½ cup of Dijon mustard with the 3 tablespoons of lemon balsamic. Whisk to combine.

Dip the chicken breast into the Dijon-lemon balsamic mixture to coat well.

Then dip the coated chicken breast into the panko mixture coating all sides well. Transfer to the prepared baking pan.  Continue for the rest of the chicken pieces.

Bake in the preheated oven until the chicken is cooked through but not dried out (about 30 minutes). Remove from oven when done and carefully transfer to plates or serving platter with a large spatula.  Enjoy!

MAKES 4 SERVINGS

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