I realized I don’t really know how to fry a chicken breast properly. I can poach one confidently — the timing, texture, and consistency make sense to me now — but pan-searing still feels uncertain. Tomorrow night, Reka and I plan to cook four chicken breasts with pasta, cream, cheese, and the last of the garden tomatoes. I want to be able to show her a reliable, repeatable way to do it.
The best short tutorial I’ve found is by Adam Ragusea, whose video How to cook chicken breast perfectly every time focuses on fundamentals: even thickness, dry surface, good heat control, and patience. His main points are straightforward:
- Pound to uniform thickness.
- Pat dry and season well.
- Use a hot pan with a thin layer of oil.
- Don’t move the chicken during the first sear.
- Flip once, finish at moderate heat, and rest before slicing.
That gives a simple, dependable method for juicy, browned chicken without guesswork.
The open question was the sauce. We wanted to use cream and cheese, but also the ripe tomatoes from the Kozek garden. I didn’t want to waste those tomatoes by overcooking them. Their flavor is delicate and easily lost in a simmered cream sauce.
The solution we settled on was a two-stage approach:
• Half the tomatoes go into the pan early — just long enough to deglaze the fond and add brightness to the sauce.
• Half stay fresh — added off the heat at the end for color and freshness.
The sequence looks like this:
- Pan-sear chicken using Ragusea’s method.
- Set aside to rest.
- In the same pan, sauté garlic and shallot.
- Add half the tomatoes for a short cook, deglaze with broth or pasta water.
- Add cream and Parmesan, simmer gently.
- Toss in cooked pasta, adjust consistency.
- Fold in remaining fresh tomatoes and herbs off the heat.
- Slice chicken and serve on top.
This keeps the technique clean and repeatable, uses the best of the tomatoes without losing their freshness, and fits naturally into a one-pan workflow.