Chicken Parm and Chick Flicks

So, my wife of sixteen years and I met in college. She was a cute little brunette Accounting major by the name of Anna. We had started dating in the fall before, but now it was February, and readily approaching was our first Valentine's Day together as a couple. For me, it was not really that big of a deal, but for her? She had just casually informed me that I was her first ever boyfriend, her first actual relationship.

I was her first real Valentine.

Clearly, this story has a happy ending with us getting married and having twin boys and all that romantic jazz, but that one, specific day will live in infamy. I decided that her first real Valentine’s Day was going to be a special one, that I was going to pull out all the stops to make it one she’ll have to tell our future kids about. Ironically, it worked, just not the way I’d intended. In my wise old age now, I know how crazy that sounds, as I would have to top this year after year after that, a Sisyphean task, if there ever was one. But I put on a suit. I had my Jeep detailed. I had a seven o’clock reservation at a wonderful artisan restaurant in the uppity vogue part of downtown. Flowers. A Buffkin-original mixtape on a burned CD that had every song Lifehouse ever recorded. I was ready-to-go.

I pull up on the street corner outside of her all-girls dormitory, and I walk suavely to the front steps with flowers in-hand. I catch the eyes of every jealous co-ed watching me chassé my way to the front door, all of them with no make-up, still in their sweatpants, evil-eyeing the handsome gentleman ready to show his girl the night of her life. I walk to the counter, the security guard at the desk is having none of my positive vibes as she demands to know what I want. She calls Anna and tells her that her date has arrived. Anna says she’ll be right down.

It takes a minute, as she’s three floors up with no elevator. I take in all the eyes critiquing me as I wait. Then she appears at the top of the staircase, stunning. Beautiful flowing skirt with a colorful long-sleeve garnet top, make-up pristine, hair pulled back into a lovely brown clip with her cute purple glasses highlighting her innocent eyes and playful smile. She beams at the sight of the flowers, and maybe at me, a little. You couldn’t slap the smile off of my face; I’m in love and she is beautiful. The guard puts her flowers into some water at the front desk, says she’ll hold onto them there. Anna puts her arm in mine, and we open the front door of the building. I stare into her eyes, and she into mine, and nothing in that moment could take away such a pure and life-affirming moment in time.

Until I miss the third step down the front staircase.

Sixteen years later, Anna and I still argue about this moment. How big is this collection of stairs? She claims I hyperbolize this staircase; first it was small, then big, and later it became mountainous, and now I’ve taken to referring to it as a “flight” of stairs. Anna claims it was four, maybe five steps. For the sake of telling a compelling story, I’m going to stick with “flight.”

I fall down the entire flight of stairs, crashing to the concrete pavement at the bottom.

Thankfully, Anna sees fit to release my arm at the start of my impending fall, else this would be the story of how I killed my then-girlfriend. No, I land with a giant thud at the bottom of the staircase, and in the process of trying to regain my balance mid-flight, I sprain my ankle worse than I ever have in my life. You’re gonna have to trust that this is not hyperbole, as I promise, I was still limping six months later. I tear my trousers, my ankle swells to three times its size, and all my hopes for the evening go up in flames.

“Are you okay?” Anna asks, ignoring all the cackling co-eds behind us.

I lay on the ground, pretending I’m not more embarrassed than I’d ever been, “I’ll live.”

“Can you get to your Jeep?”

“Look, if you want to call it a night and, you know, never be seen with me again, I’d understand,” I will myself to sit up and examine the damage.

“Don’t be silly. Can you get to your Jeep? Can you drive?”

I’m confused, my whole body hurts, and I don’t know why she would want to be seen with me. I didn’t want to be seen with me. I certainly didn’t want to subject her to this fool I’ve made of myself. “Yeah. Why?”

“C’mon,” she wraps her hand around my arm and fruitlessly tries to help me off the ground, “Take me to the grocery store. We’ll make this work.”

I shamble to my car and hoist myself into the driver’s seat as Anna hops into the passenger side. We drive to the local grocery store in a slightly suspicious part of town. She looks at me and smiles: “Do you have basic pots and pans at your house?” It isn’t a dumb question; I lived in an apartment with two other dudes, equally hopeless. I nod my head as we pull to a stop in the parking lot.

“I’ll be right back. Wait here,” she hops out and skips to the front door. She’s in there for a little while, and I’m sweating bullets trying to figure out how I can possibly salvage the evening. My house, she said. What did she mean? I had never taken her back to my place before; my apartment was very “dude-friendly” and wasn’t the kind of place you bring respectable girls back home to, and Anna was as respectable as they came. I started sweating through my already roughed-up collared shirt.

She makes it back out of the store armed with three bags of groceries. “Take me to your place,” she says.

“My place?” I say, lifting an inquisitive eyebrow.

“Calm down. Nothing wild is happening tonight, I assure you. But it’s Valentine’s and we have to eat, right? So, take me to your place.”

“Yes ma’am,” I say, and I put the Jeep in gear. I apologize the whole way to my apartment, for ruining the evening, for the potential state of my apartment and kitchen, for whatever my roommates may or may not do if they come home early this evening. Anna listens to absolutely none of it.

When we get there, I limp my way to the staircase and pull myself up to the second floor slowly; Anna keeps a polite hand on my back, as if she could do anything if my ankle gave out and I started tumbling down. We get to the landing, and I fumble my way through my keys to open the door, holding my breath for whatever warzone I might walk in on. The door opens and, thankfully, nobody is home. And the place isn’t a Greek tragedy. It isn’t “clean” by any stretch of the imagination, but it is suitable for guests. Anna motions me to the couch and to the TV remote.

“Elevate that foot,” she says, placing the groceries on the table outside the kitchen. She peers into the kitchen and makes a face, “Step one: let’s clean your kitchen.”

“I’m so sorry,” I call to the kitchen from the couch. The embarrassment sets in.

“No worries,” she calls back, “Just find us something good to watch.”

“It’s Valentine’s Day. There’s nothing but chick flicks on,” I flip channels desperately.

“Great! Find us something girly to watch. The girlier, the better.”

I landed on “Legally Blonde” and set the remote down.

“Perfect!” she exclaims, “This is one of my favorites.”

For the next few minutes, I hear a lot of noises: bangs, beatings, water boiling, sounds of fury and maybe a few grunts of disgust regarding the state of my kitchen. After a while, Anna comes out with a bag of ice that she wraps around my ankle, propped up on the coffee table with some pillows. She brings me a soda, and I ask her what she’s making. She shushes me and tells me it’s a surprise. I go back to sipping my Diet Pepsi and watching Elle destroy law school.

Not long after that, Anna appears at the door to the kitchen, “You hungry?” she asks.

“Very much,” I smile.

Out she comes with two plates of chicken parmesan, the holiest of holy dishes. I had ordered this on our first date when I was hopelessly lost and all I could think to do on a date with a pretty girl was take her to an Italian restaurant. She noticed. I found out much later that she and her mother had a habit of going to restaurants, ordering fantastic meals, and then going home wondering how they could recreate it, only better. Let me tell you: it’s quite the lucrative hobby for our marriage.

It was pan-fried chicken breasts sitting on top of a mound of rotini noodles covered in a thick layer of perfectly-seasoned tomato sauce topped with a beautiful mountaintop of parmesan and mozzarella cheese, broiled to a golden perfection. On the side were homemade cheddar biscuits glazed with a vibrant garlic butter. I was amazed. I was astounded. I was full, when all was said and done. And most importantly, I was hooked; do you know how hard it is to find a good woman, a cute woman, a smart woman, and an attractive woman, all in one fantastic woman, and she is attracted to you? Slim odds. Now add in the fact that she is a fantastic home cook, adventurous in the kitchen and with a singular focus on making you love her food? There isn’t a lottery around with a bigger jackpot.

When people ask me about the moment I knew Anna was “the one”, I tell them this story. She could also spit out the exact batting order for our college baseball team, and that just added to her greatness.

We spend the rest of the evening curled around each other on the couch watching Elle show Harvard what blonde girls can do. And there was some kissing, obviously. I realize now that I must have had garlic breath from the biscuits. Dude, that girl must’ve been really into me.

That was year one in the story of our beautiful romance. We’ve been married for sixteen years, and we dated for three years before we made it forever and ever, amen. The next year after that, she made me her chicken parm again, and we watched “Sweet Home Alabama.” The next year was at her swanky college apartment, with chicken parm and “The Notebook.” We thought it was practical, you know, avoiding crowded, expensive restaurants on the busiest night of the year. But in all actuality, it was just cute. Chicken Parm and Chick Flicks: our personal Valentine’s tradition.

This year will be year twenty of this tradition, and some things have changed. Now we have two boys that join us in the tradition. The movies have become less “Sleepless in Seattle” and more “Beauty and the Beast” and “Aladdin”, but it’s nice having a wholesome tradition that I share with my kids, and it’s nicer for them to see what a healthy, beautiful, loving relationship looks like. So when I eat this meal, I see my beautiful wife. My beautiful family. And I see what a wonderful partnership should look like.

All because I fell down a tremendous flight of stairs.

CHICKEN PARM AND CHICK FLICKS

Ingredients:

• 3-6 Boneless, skinless chicken breasts (3 for me and her, more for company)
• Italian bread crumbs
• Salt and pepper (to taste)
• Finely grated parmesan cheese
• Thick slices of mozzarella cheese
• Eggs
• Extra virgin olive oil
• 1 box of rotini pasta noodles
• 1-2 Cans of your preferred tomato sauce (we like Ragu three cheese sauce)
• Bisquick biscuit mix
• Milk
• Shredded cheddar cheese
• 1 Stick of Butter
• Garlic Powder

We start by pounding the chicken. Remember all those frustrations the extended family gave you over the Christmas holiday season? Time to take it out on the poultry. Pound out the chicken breasts so that they are all even in thickness. Hit the chicken with salt and pepper before you dredge it. Next, whisk a few eggs into a bowl to make an egg mixture, and then dredge the chicken completely in that egg mixture.

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit and start boiling a medium pot of water. Pour some Italian bread crumbs mixed with the finely grated parmesan in a freezer bag. Pull the chicken out of the egg mixture and dredge it in the crumbs and shake it like it’s Shake & Bake; my boys approve of this method. Make sure that both sides of the breasts are fully and evenly covered with the breading.

Next, time to get a pan hot. I use a standard non-stick skillet for this. I put just a few splashes of extra virgin olive oil in the pan, just enough to coat the bottom of the skillet. We’re heating this to medium-high heat; make sure the oil is hot before you start cooking. Place the breasts gently and evenly onto the skillet, listening to that beautiful sizzle. After about five minutes, flip those bad boys. You should see a golden crispness on the flipped pieces. Wait another five minutes and pull them out. Set them on a paper towel to remove the excess oil. Use an instant read meat thermometer and check that the breasts read 160-165 degrees F.

In a baking dish, put a nice layer of your preferred tomato sauce on the bottom of the dish. Place your chicken breasts evenly into the dish. Once they’re evenly distributed, pour the remainder of your sauce around the meat with a little of it on top. Pour a little more parmesan cheese onto each piece, and top each piece with a thick slice of mozzarella cheese (you can use shredded, but I love the way the thick slices look after it’s cooked). Cover it with aluminum foil to seal in that beautiful heat. Throw it on the top rack of the oven for 15-20 minutes. Anna’s favorite tip: if you open the oven and it sounds like rain dropping in the baking pan, your meat and sauce is done.

While that does its thing, pour your rotini noodles into the boiling water and salt the water liberally (note, about half a box of noodles should suffice, as the chicken will be the star of the dish). Stir occasionally so that the noodles don’t stick together.

In a mixing bowl, mix together however much baking mix as you think you’ll need with milk (I usually use about a cup of milk for every two cups of Bisquick baking mix). The consistency should be pretty thick. Add in a cup of sharp shredded cheddar cheese, mix together. Do not overmix this; if the mix is overworked and too dense, the biscuits will be the same. Oil a serving spoon and use that to scoop small chunks of the dough and plop them on a baking sheet (Anna didn’t approve of the wording of this; she said something about “spoon balls” and I stopped listening because I was giggling. Stick with my very unprofessional wording). You can judge how big you want to make them, but for me, a good single plop should be big enough (they’ll rise as they bake). Kick the oven temp up to 450 and throw the biscuits in the oven for about twelve minutes, or until they are golden brown. Be sure to remove them from the baking sheet as soon as they come out of the oven, else they’ll burn their bottoms. Nobody likes burned bottoms.

In a coffee mug, throw in half a stick of butter and a teaspoon of garlic powder and melt it in a microwave. Mix well, and then brush this on top of the fully baked biscuits.

Now the last step is the most important: you pour on some noodles, throw a breast or two on the plate, cover the noodles with some of that lovely sauce, and throw a few biscuits onto the plate. But the very last thing you do, upon placing this plate on the table, is kiss your partner. Deeply. Passionately. Kiss ‘em like you mean it. Because that’s what this dish brings out of me. Not the love I have for Valentine’s day, or even the love I have for this silly memory. This dish reminds me of the love I have for Anna. She took care of me. She nursed me back to health. And she saw fit to grace me with this fantastic meal. And she has, again and again, every year since.

So to the next chef in line: be filled and nourished by this delicious meal, and I hope you enjoy it. But if you want my advice, the most important ingredients that I didn’t list on the recipe are as follows: cook this for someone you love, someone you want to show love to. And finally, kiss them. Like picking the right wine to pair with your meal, a beautiful kiss will make this all taste better.

Sprained ankles are optional. Bon appétit!