Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Chicken Wrapped in Pancetta with Leeks and Thyme

I love Jamie Oliver - everything about him makes me happy. I've been following him since he was "The Naked Chef" years ago. I love his cool, hip, reckless style of cooking. To me, he takes away any hint of chef-snobbery, and makes cooking appear un-intimidating and fun, (which is the way it should be!) If you don't have a cookbook of his, I suggest you grab one, any one is well worth the money. His recipes are loosely written, and in way that it feels like he's talking, guiding you through each page, so it's great for any cooking level. This recipe comes from Cook with Jamie, and it is my husband's absolute favorite. The chicken is moist, flavorful, and the leeks are buttery soft and pretty amazing. I like to serve it with a simple arugula salad and rice or cous-cous, to sop up the yummy pan juices.


Chicken Wrapped in Pancetta with Leeks and Thyme
From Cooking with Jamie
Serves 2-4

2 Organic chicken breasts, bone in, skin removed
2 leeks, trimmed and washed
a few sprigs of thyme
about 1 TBLS butter
pinch of sea salt and fresh ground pepper
2 TBLS dry white wine
About 1/4 lb sliced pancetta (I buy hormone, cruelty free)

Preheat oven to 400
In a bowl add chicken, leeks, thyme, salt, pepper, butter and wine.
Toss around and place in a roasting pan. (I lined my pan with tin-foil, per Jamie's suggestion, for easy cleanup).
Wrap chicken breasts with pancetta, place on top of leeks.
Fold the tin foil inwards, to protect leeks from burning.
Drizzle top of chicken with olive oil and place a few sprigs of thyme on top.
Bake for about 45 minutes.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

OOOOhhh... my gosh. I am totally making this one day! DELISH!

My Farmhouse Kitchen said...

yum..this looks so good..and YES! i have a BIG CRUSH on Jamie..BIG...

making this .....this week