We grew up with chicken parm (served with French fries!) on the dinner rotation. Man, I loved that meal. Then, for a while, I neither made nor ate parm. I’m not sure what happened. Maybe it had too many steps. Maybe red sauce Italian would just never fully be okay again.
Yet with the emergence of Parm as an NYC restaurant force, the dish is truly back. I decided to figure out the best methods for making it, plus suss out where it came from in the first place, what’s authentic when it comes to parm, and if you really need to bread eggplant and let frying crumbs splatter in your face to make a great dish.
You can read the full piece, with recipes and tips, over at First We Feast.