Friday Fixin’s: Whole Wheat Peanut Butter Waffles with Seasoned, Panko-Crusted Chicken
Now that is a mouthful…
…OF DELICIOUSNESS! I was inspired by the classic dish Fried Chicken with Waffles. I’m a pretty big health nut, so I don’t do fried foods and buttery baked goods often. So, I came up with this healthy alternative. I found a recipe for the pancakes via Epicurious, and I did a couple tweaks to build on the health of it:
- I used 1% Milk instead of Whole Milk, which saves about 100 calories and 11 grams of fat.
- I used a tablespoon of honey instead of sugar. I prefer to use honey because it’s unprocessed, and I think the honey makes the batter a little sweeter, softer and silkier in texture.
- I used 1/4 cup of olive oil instead of vegetable oil.
To make the chicken, you’ll need:
- 1 lb of skinless chicken breast
- 3 eggs, beaten
- 2 cups of Panko breadcrumbs
- 1 cup whole wheat flour
- 1/2 Tbsp. salt
- 1/2 Tbsp. pepper
- 1/2 Tbsp. cinnamon
Combine the flour, salt, pepper, and cinnamon on a plate. Place one cup of Panko on another plate. The eggs, seasoned flour, and panko should be lined up in this order: egg, flour, panko. This assembly line setup will make it easy when you dredge the chicken. To dredge the chicken, take one of the breasts in your dominant hand: dip into the egg. Remove from the egg, holding the breast so excess egg drips back into the bowl. Take the breast and coat with the seasoned flour. Dip into the egg again, and then coat with the panko breadcrumbs. Repeat for all pieces of chicken.
You can then either bake the chicken in an oven, or grill it in a saute pan. I used some olive oil Pam and did it in the saute pan. Let me tell you: this is REALLY good. The cinnamon in the seasoned flour gives the chicken a really wonderful warmth that goes well with the crunch of the panko. When you eat a piece of chicken with a piece of waffle, it’s an explosion of crunch in your mouth. The sweetness of the batter mixes with the cinnamon, and it gives an aromatic, sweet crunch that goes down as softly as velvet cake.
Okay, that may sound a bit contrived, but this recipe is freakin’ awesome. So there. And the best part about these waffles is that the peanut butter gives a robust, savory flavor and texture to the waffles which makes them REALLY versatile. I had leftover batter, and I put fresh banana pieces right on top of the batter before I closed the waffle iron. Heaaaavenlyyyy!
So eat up, and enjoy!
