Sfincione and a quick dinner

I spent the day in Palermo on Tuesday doing some shopping and walking around the city. I got a quick lunch at a panificio near Teatro Massimo that has really good sfincione. Traditional sfincione is thick focaccia bread topped with a little tomato sauce, onion, anchovy and maybe some grated cheese (usually caciocavallo). Some bread shops make more than just one type and the toppings can vary widely. It's very basic Sicilian street food and you really can't go wrong ordering it. It's also served a lot in bars as an accompaniment with a cocktail during aperitivo time. They usually cut it up into small squares and you can munch on it with your negroni before dinner. This is one of my favorite things about living in Sicily: the overwhelming presence of well made negronis and salty snacks before dinner...

Most sfincione I've had in Sicily is good, in fact, I can't EVER remember having a bad one, but some bakeries just do it better than others and this place is one of them. I walked in with my heart set on a slice with prosciutto, arugula and parmigiano...but they were all out. I settled for olive and tuna and found a bench in a little square about a block from the shop. The focaccia was dressed with a very light coating of tomato paste, olives, tuna, mozzarella and a few leaves of parsley. Perfect.

I got home late that night and Scott had been to the market already to buy some things for dinner: bread, fennel, carrots, thinly sliced chicken breasts and a bottle of wine. Side note here: clearly, Scott purchased this chicken because I hardly ever buy chicken breasts. I'm much more of a thigh girl. Braised chicken thighs are my favorite. I'm getting hungry for it right now as I type this.

Back to Tuesday night: we were hungry, it was getting a little late and we didn't feel like messing with a lot of things in the kitchen. I turned on the oven, scrambled an egg, got some breadcrumbs out of the freezer and drizzled some olive oil on a sheet pan. The chicken was dipped in egg, then breadcrumbs and placed on the pan, I drizzled the top of it with a little more oil and then it went into the hot oven for about 15 minutes. While the chicken was in the oven Scott made a fennel salad: thin slices of fennel, shreds of carrots, golden raisins, parsley, a pinch of cumin and a splash of olive oil and red wine vinegar. We also whisked together a little sulla honey and dijon mustard as a super quick and seriously tasty sauce for the chicken. Think of it as a healthier version of chicken fingers with honey mustard. There's also the added bonus of having less to clean up after dinner and you can't beat that.

We finished off the meal with a ridiculous amount of camembert and bread - which of course cancelled out the lower calorie version of the chicken. Whatever - I am who I am and that means I will probably never turn down an oozing piece of camembert on crusty bread. I refuse to apologize for that!