Crispy Chicken with Grapefruit Honey Sauce

If you ever come to my home for dinner, you might be surprised by the comments made.  My children have been known to describe a meal as a "nice effort" and "good, but not my best."  As a parent, I am constantly striving to raise respectful and responsible children with excellent manners.  However, when it comes to food I tend to encourage my family to give feedback, both good and bad. 

Common dinner discussions include requests for a rating of the meal out of ten; whether it should be repeated; what should be kept the same and what should be done differently.  I love hearing what they enjoy about the food and what they don't and their score of the dish.  For guests, this can be a little unsettling as they hear what sounds a lot like disrespectful criticism!

Which brings me to this chicken.  I won't tell you what my rating was, but Don said it was a 9.7 after having 3 helpings.  It's a fairly simple chicken that is breaded and fried with a fresh grapefruit honey sauce that is both sweet and sour.  Luke ate his without the sauce and declared it delicious!  A perfect compromise for those of you with picky eaters in the family.

Next time I'd be tempted to bake the chicken in the oven and avoid the frying in oil to lighten things up a bit.  I suspect it would be just as tasty.  I used a combination of cornflake crumbs and panko breadcrumbs because it was literally all I had left of both ingredients.  You could use just one or the other but my choice if it goes in the oven will be the cornflakes.  I will often purchase a box of Cornflakes (on sale of course) and throw the whole package in the food processor.  These crumbs will keep for quite awhile on your shelf and come in handy for breading fish, chicken, cheese strings or veggies. They also make a nice topping on macaroni and cheese.

If you decide to make this chicken, do me a favour and leave a rating in the comments.  I'd love to hear your feedback too!

Crispy Chicken with Grapefruit Honey Sauce
Adapted from Mark Bittman's Kitchen Express
4 chicken breasts

1/4 cup cornflake or panko crumbs

1 egg

1/4 cup flour

salt/pepper
1 Tbsp butter/oil

1or 2 grapefruit; segmented and juiced.

1 Tbsp honey

1 clove garlic

Pound chicken breasts until uniform thickness of about 1".  Set out 3 bowls: one for flour, one for egg and one for crumbs.  Add a good dash of salt and pepper to the flour. Take a chicken breast and dip it in the flour, then the egg and then the crumbs.  Repeat using all 4 breasts.  In a frying pan on medium high, add butter and melt.  Place 2 chicken breasts in and cover for approximately 5 min.  Flip over and leave another five.  Repeat with next two breasts.  I kept mine warm in the oven on low while cooking the second two and then making the sauce. 
For the sauce, wipe the pan clean.  Remove skin from grapefruit and cut segments out.  Squeeze out remaining juice (approximately 1/2 cup juice).  Add some more oil or butter and minced garlic for about a minute.  Add grapefruit juice and honey and reduce until syrupy (about 5min).  Serve the chicken drizzled with the sauce and grapefruit slices.  Enjoy!