Panko-Crusted Chicken

Tonight, I was inspired to make a recipe that featured Panko, a Japanese type of bread crumb. It may sound like an exotic ingredient but you can find Panko bread crumbs in any supermarket, next to regular, Italian-flavored bread crumbs. I found the recipe for Panko-Crusted Chicken Bites on the We Are Not Martha blog. Instead of cutting up the chicken into smaller pieces, I bought breast tenders instead.


Here are the bowls of flour, beaten egg and Panko/Parmesan cheese waiting for the chicken pieces:




First, I dredged each tender through a flour/salt/pepper mixture:



Next was beaten egg/water:


Finally, the Panko/Parmesan cheese mixture, which stuck surprisingly well:

I placed each tender on a cooking spray-covered cookie rack, which was resting on top of a foil covered cookie sheet:


Twenty minutes in the oven and the tenders came out looking like this:

They were nice and crunchy and the Parmesan flavor came through in a nice, subtle way. Unfortunately, I didn't have the ingredients for the apricot dipping sauce on hand, which I would've loved to try. Instead, I whipped up an Asian-style sauce that had soy sauce, sesame oil, apple cider vinegar, garlic, sugar and hoisin sauce. It was ok, and Andrew liked it, but I really thought the chicken deserved a sweeter sauce to accompany it.