- Should we take a collective
deep breath, you and I?
[deep breaths]
That feels good, feels great.
- Alright let's do this.
- So this recipe we developed together.
It was a very special moment for us
back when we used to
work in the same place.
- You know this recipe, it
shouldn't be that complicated
and yet every little
element was more complicated
than we anticipated.
- Well that's also because
there's like five elements
to this, right?
One of those is the
sauce, the chicken itself,
the cheese ratio and
combination and types of cheeses
and then how it all comes together.
So you already made your sauce, correct?
- I made my sauce ahead of time.
I used tomato purée.
- But actually I couldn't find purée
so I got crushed tomatoes
and I wizzed them
in the food processor.
- There you go.
- I'm gonna make the sauce over here
because I didn't have time
to make it this morning.
You already did, good for you.
You're ahead of the game.
- With the sauce, I did not
do the onions this time.
I love the onions 'cause they
impart that kind of sweetness
- What the hell?
- Well, the reason why is 'cause
I have a certain 12
year old in my household
who when I put onions in the tomato sauce
he gets all cranky and complains about it.
- Oh!
- But I do remember the first
time we tested this recipe,
Molly went with a, I would say,
a very rustic cut of the onions
and they were big and chunky
and they were a bit much.
- It wasn't rustic it
was just a diced onion.
- I would say it was
more of a chunked onion
than a minced onion.
- It was, I've never
chunked an onion in my life.
I don't even
- says you.
think I know how to chunk an onion.
- Apparently you do.
- Alright, this is what we
mean when we say finely chopped
and not chunked.
So we sort of want these small enough
that they will more or less disappear
into the sauce towards the end.
- We always talk about this
with caramelizing onions
and stuff, and we're
not really caramelizing,
but it always takes a little
bit longer than you think
and don't just turn up the heat
thinking that you can expedite the process
'cause then they'll get all
kinda charred and burned
and you don't want that
flavor in your sauce.
- Yeah, tomato paste going in.
So, this is now turning a shade darker.
So I'm going in with one
whole can of tomato purée.
Another thing that we noticed
is it really does make a difference
when you use high quality canned tomatoes.
And then I'm adding some
red pepper flake, some salt,
and then a little bit of sugar
to enhance the natural
sweetness of the tomatoes.
Okay so, that's it.
I am now just going to
bring this to a simmer,
cover it and let it do its
thing for like 40 minutes or so,
until it's reduced and I'll taste it
and it will be hopefully delicious.
You ready?
Is yours warm?
What's up with your sauce?
Where it at?
Let me see it.
- My sauce, well it's over here.
It's already in the pot and everything.
See kinda in there, I got
the good amount of oil,
I got four garlic cloves crushed,
little bit of chili
flakes, salt and sugar.
- [Molly] Great.
- Okay, chef I'm gonna go get
my chicken from the fridge.
- [laughter] Okay.
- Alright so we have like
the big chicken breast
which is technically
half a breast, correct?
- No.
- Like this is one chicken
breast total, right?
- No.
I think that we refer to this as a breast
and this as a breast.
These are breasts.
- Yeah, okay.
- These are two breasts.
- Can you show me how to butterfly,
'cause like where do we start?
- The cut you're making
is gonna go like this.
- Yeah, and then am I going
almost all the way to the end?
To open it up like a book?
- Yeah, I would,
you see how there's like
this seam right here?
- Yeah, I see that.
- I would go like about to there.
- Uh huh.
- I would cut in that way
about to there and then unfold.
- Oh okay, yeah, perfect,
alright I'm gonna try that.
And be even throughout, right?
- [Molly] Yup, you just
want it basically in half.
- Oh look at that, and it's
like a little heart, look!
- Yes, perfect!
- That's pretty good.
- [Molly] That's your best one yet.
- Alright so I do one
and then I do the other.
- One.
- And then we're gonna
pound these guys, right?
And look at that Molly, hey, hey.
- Another one, wow.
- Hey.
- Okay, so now we're
gonna put each of these
one by one between two pieces of plastic.
So, okay, excuse the
noise, but [pounding].
How is yours making no noise?
Are you sure yours are flattening at all?
- I don't know what kinda
of acoustics you have
in your kitchen, but yeah mine's awesome.
- I feel pretty good about this guy.
- I think mine's, I don't know,
I don't like to overuse the word perfect,
[pounding]
but I think mine's pretty kinda perfect.
- Great.
- Alright, so now we're
doing the marinade, right?
- Yup.
- So we like to always grate
with a microplane of some sort.
Watch your fingers.
So the full recipe is six garlic cloves
and we're doing a half recipe
so we're doing three garlic cloves.
- How much lemon juice are we doing?
- I think it's like two
tablespoons plus a little.
I'm adding olive oil.
I'm going to season my cutlets with salt.
So we don't have a measured amount
but just use your best judgment.
- So you like a little
bit of salt on the cutlets
before you put them in.
- A little bit?
What do you mean?
- I'm just saying you're
not seasoning the marinade,
you're seasoning the cutlets.
- Yeah, but I wouldn't
call it a little bit,
I would call it like
the exact right amount.
- Oui, chef.
- Can I see, can you tilt down?
I wanna see how much salt you're putting.
- I'm just doing like you're
- I'm not comfortable.
- I'm doing enough, I'm not overdoing it.
It's gonna be enough.
I've cooked enough with you, Molly,
to know how much salt is
the right amount of salt.
How 'bout that?
- Looks great!
And then yeah, every once in a while
we can turn them over to make
sure they're getting coated
on all sides when we think of it.
- Alright are we ready to do this, boss?
- Okay so walk us
through the proper order,
because I feel like people
sometimes get confused
which comes first.
- First thing is we go in the flour.
I think the important thing is,
Molly, is to evenly coat it,
but then shake of the excess.
So that looks pretty good, right?
- Yeah that looks great.
- Alright so now we're
gonna go into the egg.
I forgot that we're
using big, whole breasts.
These plates are way too small.
Another thing is, again,
let it sort of drip off.
You don't want that excess egg.
- And make sure that there
are no parts of the cutlet
where there are dry
spots of flour remaining
because any flour that's not egged
will not pick up the panko.
- I like to packed 'em on there.
What do you think, Molly?
- Yes, definitely.
I think that's how you
achieve that really nice,
well-coated, panko crust
without having to do
like a crazy double dredge situ.
Okay, look at my cutlets.
- Oh, wow, that's like thorough.
- Beauties!
Okay, I'm gonna clean up
my dredging station now.
In the meantime, I'm gonna
put these in the fridge
because we discovered
that when you add breading
to something like chicken and
let it chill in the fridge,
the breading or the panko hydrates
from the moisture in the
egg and in the cutlet
and as a result you get this
like much more distinct crust,
crackly crust over the entire thing,
than if you were to just
go straight into the oil.
- Getting the parm, bluh, bluh, bluh.
Getting the cutlets
from the fridge, right?
- Um no, hold on a second.
I just wanna check in on my sauce.
Here's mine, that's for you.
- That's nice, yeah, that's not bad.
- Oh thanks.
We have our oil going.
- Alright so here we go.
And obviously, as they
say, Molly, correct?
You always go away from you.
You kinda lay it in.
- [Molly] Correct.
- [Adam] And then lay it down slowly.
Oh let's, I'm gonna bring the camera over.
- [Molly] Okay.
- [Adam] Ooo, look at that.
- [Molly] I'm going in.
- [Adam] Yup, okay, you're going in.
Mine is a little spotty I would say,
but it's pretty good in terms
of like golden crispiness.
- Are you in the weeds over there?
- I'm struggling in terms of, well,
A) I don't have a cooling rack.
B) when you're doing it this big,
oh wait we gotta do salt right?
The little seasoning
sort of salt egg deal.
Oh wow, that's gorgeous, look at that!
I found mine was a little
hard to get it out of the pot
'cause this cutlet is so big and heavy.
That was a challenge for me.
- Yeah, you know what I did?
I used those weird tongy-scissors
and I also used like another
tool to help lift it.
So it was like double handed.
How's your second one looking?
- I got a spatula now,
I got this sort of like smash
burger spatula and this.
- Alright, mine's coming out.
There she is, I'm showing you my cutlet.
- Oh my God!
You know what, I'm so jealous!
Geez that's amazing.
Listen to that, yeah!
Yeah man!
- Yeah man!
- Alright, oil off.
Oh salt, gotta put another salt.
- Cutlets to camera.
So final moments here are the assembly,
which is also important.
I guess this is when we
can talk about cheese
and where we landed with that.
- Hold on, whoo, did you see that?
- Cool.
- Okay, so mozzarella.
I went with the Polly-O low moisture mozz.
- And then, obviously, parm.
- Fresh grated parm, finely grated.
And we're gonna mix the
two together, right?
- Yeah so we're making
like a cheese mixture
and if you can get your
hands on it, obviously,
Parmigiano-Reggiano is the way to go here.
So I'm gonna assemble this in
a like 9 by 13 baking dish.
And then I kind of like
even it out so it's not,
like you're not just taking
a ladle and plopping it on.
You wanna kind of evenly,
almost the way that you
would sauce a pizza,
and a really important
part of this recipe,
that we spent a lot of time considering,
is making sure that we
leave some of those corners
peaking out completely unsauced, uncheesed
so that we just get every once in a while
a very crispy cutlet moment,
that's not totally smothered and wet.
- Alright, Molly, how does that look?
Can you see that?
In terms of crispy parts
still sticking out.
- Beautiful!
I think that looks great.
- So now I'm just gonna take the cheese
and again an even application.
Alright, can I see what yours looks like
before it goes into the oven?
Oh that looks good.
- Okay.
- Alright, so broiler only.
Not 500, not like that,
just all the way broiler.
- Yup, and we're looking
for good leoparding.
- [Adam] Oh yeah, best word ever.
- So that like spotty browning.
Best word ever for cheese.
- I would just say, whoo.
- Oh my God, enough.
- That it's important
to know your broiler.
Certain broilers are crazy hot.
Certain are less hot.
- Speaking of which, would you
like to see le chicken parm?
- Yes, oh looking good.
Oh look at that.
- Oh my God I'm freaking excited!
Yum!
- So I'm gonna now do the parsley, right?
- Yeah, micro minced.
- [Adam] Boss, look at that.
- That looks awesome.
- [Adam] I mean seriously.
- The cheese pullage, the cheese pullage
that you have going on there is phenoms.
K look at mine.
- That's you, that's not bad, you know.
- Not bad?
- [laughter] It's looking pretty good.
- That is like the most
iconic chicken parm
you've ever seen.
- I'm digging on this.
- Okay, should we have
ourselves some chicken P now?
- Oh we just get to dig in?
Yeah, I mean, right?
- I mean yeah.
- Obviously.
Simone, you want some?
- [Simone] Yums.
- See that's like the
best piece right there,
where you get a crispy edge
and a sauce and a cheesy.
- Oh my God!
- She just said "Oh my
God!" how 'bout that?
How 'bout "Oh my God!" is that good?
- You like?
- The best.
- Oh she just said it's my best!
- Maybe it's a little thick.
- Oh my God!
- Oh my God!
I'm sorry.
- The flavor, the lemon garlic marinade
and then the bread crumbs
that are like seasoned
but not overly seasoned
and the mix of the parm and the mozz.
- Sharp and milky and creamy.
- Yeah, and cheese pully.
Um this was awesome, can we
do like a virtual high five
across the country?
- Yes! [slaps]
- I'm literally gonna go open some wine
and finish eating this.
- Great, it's like twelve o'clock here
so I'm gonna proceed on my day.
- Alright this is amazing.
- Thanks for hanging.
- You're awesome.
This recipe is BA's best.
See you guys, bye.
- [Molly] Bye.
You don't want the oil
necessarily to interfere
with any of the flavor here.
It's just there to make
your [beep] really crispy.
- Have you noticed that
I haven't been cursing
on this video?
I've been watching my
mouth unlike some of us.
Are you like one of
those professional chefs
who like curses at her staff
and is always yelling at them?
- No, what do you mean by staff?
I work for you.
- I've seen you in the
test kitchen before,
like you don't know I'm there,
and you're like yelling
at people and everything,
seen you throw a pan a few times.
- What are you talking about?
I am the most composed
person in that test kitchen.
- Wow, throwing your
colleagues under the bus.
- Got a bunch of crazies in that kitchen.
