Easy Chicken Saltimbocca

Today marks 2 years since my father passed away. I wanted to honor him in his very favorite way: with home cooked Italian food.

Saltimbocca was probably his VERY favorite dish to make for people. He had a whole routine; A somewhat complex recipe that lived partially scribbled on a random piece of paper, that we have yet to find, and partially just in his brain. He always served his Saltimbocca with herby potato coins which is the next recipe of his that I hope to master.

Unfortunately, we haven’t been able to find his recipe anywhere for this saltimbocca dish so my re-make of it is a best guess based on taste and a bit of research.

While my dad always made his saltimbocca with pork (which is the more traditional way to serve it), I decided to make my own version of it with chicken. Truthfully, I don’t have a lot of experience cooking pork AND I thought chicken would be a little more approachable for people looking for an easy dinner recipe.

Plus, I’m just that kid who always HAS to do something different than what my parents tell me :)

If you aren’t familiar with Saltimbocca, the word literally means “jump in the mouth” in Italian which SO accurately describes how DELICIOUS this dish is. I swear, this is one of the BEST recipes on my blog. Admittedly, it’s NOT the prettiest dish in the world. I had a really hard time trying to take pretty photos of this. BUT it’s good. SO so good. 

How to make Chicken Saltimbocca

For this dish, we’re going to use very thin pieces of chicken breast (aka, cutlets). I simply cut my chicken breasts in half and left it at that. Some recipes also have you pound the chicken until it’s a certain thickness. I typically can’t be bothered with that so I simple go in knowing that each piece of chicken might cook at slightly different lengths depending on the thickness.

The chicken is salt and peppered and then sprinkled with fresh sage. The fresh sage is largely what makes this dish SO GOOD. A piece of prosciutto is then pressed onto the chicken breast, on top of the sage. While not completely necessary, I used a toothpick to hold the prosciutto and the sage onto the chicken. My dad did it this way so it’s one of those small things that I wanted to incorporate into the dish. Plus it makes it easier to hold everything together when you flip the meat.

The chicken is cooked in a large skillet and then set aside while you make the sauce. OMG THE SAUCE! Guys, it’s so good! If drinking saltimbocca sauce was an acceptable thing to do, I would. I so would. Licking your plate IS acceptable in our house so go ahead and do that, though!

The saltimbocca sauce consists of shallot, broth, wine, butter, parsley, and lemon juice. SO simple but somehow one of the best sauces I’ve ever had.

Altogether, this dish takes less than 30 minutes to make. You can pop some veggies in the oven to roast while the chicken is cooking for a full meal!

AND that’s it. Saltimbocca is one of those dishes that many people are intimidated by but it’s SO EASY! This seriously comes together in less than 30 minutes and is SO GOOD (have I said that yet??). I’m excited to see my brother in a few weeks just so that I can cook this dish for him and see how he thinks it stacks up to what our dad always cooked. Get ready, Jonathan!

PLEASE make this dish and then let me know how you liked it!!

Print