Chicken Parmigiana

Made chicken parm tonight...

I used two chicken cutlets and it ended up being too much for two people. I should have stuck with 1 and 1/2 cutlets. I would have had just enough for dinner and lunch tomorrow.

Overall, it came out good but not as good as I would have liked. I was just telling SJ earlier that I still prefer Olive Garden's version. I have two problems with my version. (1) I don't like the texture of the chicken. The chicken was tender and juicy but something was off. I can't quite describe it... and (2) The breading doesn't stick to the chicken as much as I like. I want to be able to scratch the chicken with a knife without having the breading slide off. I'm starting to think it's not possible to make breaded chicken cutlets like that at home.

The pasta was great. I picked up a pound of fresh fettuccine from Leo's Ravioli for $3.75 and I only used about half of it. The place is 15 mins from my house so it wasn't really out of the way at all.

The alfredo sauce was from a bottle (Bertolli). Not bad. I've never had any other brand so I'm not sure how it compares with others.

The strings beans was a nice touch. I think it goes really well with the chicken and pasta. Thanks SJ and M for the idea! I squeezed some lemon juice on it and it was yummy ;)

Note: I haven't given up! I'm going to try a different breading technique the next time I make this and see if it gets me closer to my goal.

Update (03-18-13):

Don't laugh at me but on my way to work and back, I was thinking about what could have went wrong. I decided on the following:

I didn't pan fry the cutlets long enough. Even though I had my heat on the low side, my chicken cutlets browned very easily. I would say the chicken got brown within 2 mins or so. Because I didn't want to burn the breading, I took out the chicken once it was browned. I think this cause the chicken itself taste the way it did...like it was steamed. I think I'm looking for that "fried" taste if that makes any sense.

Maybe I should invest in a bigger pot and really deep fry my cutlets next time? Maybe this will make the inside of the chicken to taste differently? Hmmm....