Chicken Rolls with Peaches & Spinach


I dubbed this week my "food elimination week".  We are leaving for a long vacation and my main goal is to leave the kitchen bare of any candidate for decomposition.  Practically everything fresh and cured.  No one wants to come back home with a little surprise on a platter of dreaded moldy food that miraculously quadrupled in size and altered the homely smell to something indescribably horrendous. 


The refrigerator can only hear my heavy exhales everytime I open it to mentally calculate and coordinate how I can combine what are inside.  The week had passed and I am on to my last meal tonight of a ham & cheese platter with some frittata.  As frustrating it was,  I successfully apportioned everything the whole week.

These rolls are from the beginning of the week when I had the luxury of cooking fresh chicken fillet and peaches.  I've always loved mixing fruit with meat or fish and this combination is worth a try like the others I have posted.  The peaches added a twist of a pleasant fruity & floral flavor to the chicken.

Until my next post from the beautiful mountains of the Dolomites!



Chicken Rolls with Peaches & Spinach

Ingredients:
Serves 4
  • 400 grams chicken fillet 
  • extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 garlic, crushed
  • 50 grams pancetta affumicata (smoked), diced
  • 100 grams spinach 
  • 3 ripe peaches, pitted, peeled & chopped
  • salt
  • pepper
  • 1/2 teaspoon finely chopped mint leaves + some for decorating
  • 1/2 teaspoon finely chopped parsley
  • 1/2 cup port + a dash
Directions:
  1. Pound the chicken fillet with a meat tenderizer.  Set aside.
  2. Over medium heat, in a saucepan with extra virgin olive oil, sautè the garlic and the pancetta until the pancetta are toasted. Discard the garlic when it turns golden brown.
  3. Add the spinach.  Toss with the pancetta for a few minutes until its volume reduces.  
  4. Add the peaches.  Season with salt & pepper.  Cook for a few minutes.
  5. Add the parsley & mint then a dash of port.  When the alcohol evaporates, turn off the fire.
  6. Lay one chicken fillet flat on a plate.  Spoon some filling.  Roll and secure with a food stick.  Repeat until you finish all the chicken.  
  7. If you have some extra filling, set is aside to sautè along with the chicken rolls.  
  8. In the same saucepan where you cooked the filling, pour some extra virgin olive oil.  Sautè the chicken rolls.  Brown all sides.  
  9. Add 1/4 cup of port and let the alcohol evaporate.  When it evaporates, turn off the fire.  
  10. Slice the rolls.  Pour the sauce on the rolls.  Drizzle with extra virgin olive oil before serving.