Taming the Giant

I am sure everybody who cooks at home at all has discovered that there is a new species of animal in the grocery story….the giant chicken breast.  You pretty much have to buy organic at a high end grocery store to get a boneless, skinless chicken breast that is a anywhere a single portion size.

I have recently discovered that the chicken breasts at Aldi’s (a deep discount store with its own labels) are really, really big, really, really cheap, and really, really good.  What is not to like, except that size issue.  (I did some googling around the internet and these giant breasts seem to be a trend that is not going away).

So I decided to tame the giant.  I had bought a huge package of breasts on a good sale at Aldi’s and frozen them individually in sandwich bags and put them into a bigger bag.  I had cooked a couple as is and found it dry and boring. This time II took out one and partially thawed it.  While it was still about 1/3 to 1/4 frozen, I started cutting it into smaller chunks, and then sliced those chunks  into thinner slices by slicing horizontally.  When the meat is partially frozen, this is a breeze. 

Then I put those pieces onto plastic wrap, covered with another piece of wrap, and started pounding.  I ended up with a random pile of little cutlets.  I shook those cutlets in flour, dipped them in egg beaters, then in dried, unsweetened coconut and baked them on a rack.  Oh my.  No guilt coconut chicken tenders!

 

 

 

The next giant breast I attacked was shaken in flour and browned in a little olive oil.  Removed from pan and patted off extra fat, poured in some bottled asian orange sauce into the skillet and put the chicken back in the pan and glazed it.  This version was actually better, maybe because I love glaze or because it was pan sauteed?  Probably both.