Recipe of the Week: Chicken Nuggets (Baked)

I don't have kids but I imagine that these would make for a nice, kid-friendly meal. I served them with oven baked french fries and salad.

Prep Time: 10 minutes plus 15 minutes marinating time Cook Time: 20 minutes

Marinade Ingredients:
1 cup buttermilk
1 Tbsp lemon juice
1 tsp soy sauce
1/4 tsp sweet paprika

Chicken Nugget Ingredients:
3/4 pound skinless, boneless chicken breast, cut into 1-inch cubes
3/4 cup flour
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
1 egg, beaten with 1 Tbsp of water
1 cup panko (or regular) breadcrumbs (I used panko)
1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese
Dipping sauces, such as BBQ and honey mustard

Instructions:
1. Combine all marinade ingredients in a medium bowl. Add chicken and stir to coat well. Cover and let marinate in the refrigerator at least 15 minutes and up to 2 hours. ( I only did it for 15 min and it was fine)
2. Preheat oven to 400F. Coat a baking sheet with cooking spray. Pour flour onto a dinner plate and season with salt and pepper. Have beaten egg ready in small bowl. Combine breadcrumbs and Parmesan cheese on a shallow plate. Working with one piece of a time, remove chicken from marinade (shaking off excess) and dredge in flour to coat. Dip into egg mixture then coat completely with breadcrumb mixture and place on prepared baking sheet. Continue until all pieces are coated and placed on a sheet. (OK so this was a little too much work from me..call me lazy..so I just put the flour and the breadcrumb mixture into 2 separate bags and put all the chicken pieces in the bags and shook them up instead of doing 1 piece at a time and it worked well and was less messy.)
3. Bake until golden and cooked through, about 20 minutes (turn nuggets halfway through to crisp both sides). Serve with dipping sauces.

Tamara's Take: I'd give this around an 8. I don't even know why I rate these things with numbers because it really doesn't mean much to anyone else since they don't know my scale. Anyway, this was easy and delicious. The nuggets were light and crunchy with a nice taste even without the sauce. Next time I think I will add some hot pepper to the mix to add an extra kick to it. If I ever babysit someone's kids and I need to fix a meal I will definitely consider making these for them.

If you try it, I hope you enjoy!