Last Night's Dinner: Parmesan Chicken Cutlets with Cherry Tomato Salad

When I did our menu planning for the week, I knew we wouldn't have a lot of of time last night to make dinner, so I went looking for a fast recipe.  I decided to pull another one out of America's Test Kitchen 30-Minute Suppers, which I reviewed a few days ago.  This time I looked carefully for one that wouldn't require a lot in the way of prep, and I quickly settled on a recipe on the very first page:  Parmesan Chicken Cutlets with Cherry Tomato Salad.  The prep demands weren't very high - grating some Parmesan, chopping up some fresh basil, organizing the ingredients - so I figured the total time probably wouldn't be a lot more than the advertised 30 minutes.

It ended up taking about 45 minutes to prepare from the moment I started getting out ingredients to the time I put it on the table, so I would have to say that's pretty good.   And as far as flavor... well, it was wonderful.  The chicken - dipped in flour, then egg, then finally in a mix of Parmesan and panko crumbs - was tender and moist, the coating crunchy and light, and the salad, used to cover the dish in place of the marinara more traditionally used to top Parmesan chicken, was delicious.  Of course, it's hard to go wrong with garden-fresh cherry tomatoes, fresh basil, garlic and olive oil, but still, I have to give the ATK people credit, I wouldn't have thought of using that combination to top a dish in this manner.  I expect we'll be making this again soon.  This recipe gets five stars.