Chicken Paillard

A paillard is simply a piece of meat pounded so that it is one even thickness. You will recognize the "paillard" if you've had schnitzel or chicken fried steak. Wiener Schnitzel is just veal pounded thin, breaded, and fried. I believe we had Wiener Schnitzel in Vienna on our honeymoon, though we weren't overly impressed by it. In fact, I probably had none considering veal grosses me out.

Over on this side of the pond, a paillard is used mainly so you can cook stuff quickly. A normal chicken breast would probably take 12-14 minutes in my kitchen to cook, but these took about 3 minutes per side. Last week I made paillard but couldn't find my grill pan so they were cooked in a regular nonstick skillet. I can tell you the grilled version is FAR superior.

These received very little treatment, just a brushing of olive oil, salt, and pepper. I went a little heavy on the pepper, and they were a little spicy when done.

You can use a lot of things to pound the meat thin - DO NOT use the pointy side of one of those meat mallets. Ever. For anything. They'll just tear up your meat. One of the things that basically looks like a metal disk with a handle on top work well. You need one that has enough heft that when you come down on the meat it actually does something. You can improvise with a rolling pin, but the problem is that it's so large that the end gets a lot more pressure than the middle, and you end up bashing the heck out of the meat and getting holes in it. If you're using a rolling pin, come down lightly and from not a high distance and use the middle of the pin, not the end.

I have this one, which was a wedding gift. I think I would prefer to have this one in the upper right - they call it a pounder.

Pound your meat out between 2 pieces of plastic wrap or parchment paper to about a 1/4 inch thickness. Brush with oil and season with salt, pepper, and whatever other seasonings you want. A brush of dijon mustard would be nice, sprinkled with some dried thyme.

Heat your grill pan over high heat. Using tongs place your paillard in the pan. It will stick - don't worry about it! At some point, it will start to release (after some nice grill marks are placed) and you can turn it 45 degrees if you want to get nice marks. Cook for about 3-4 minutes. Turn over and do the same to the other side. Remove from pan and let sit for about 5 minutes before serving.

Serve with mashed potatoes, salad, pasta, or any vegetable you like. A nice easy, healthful meal.