Mother's Day, a little late  

Posted by Rachel in , , , , , ,

Mother's Day was a little bit ago, I know. BUT, I am consistent in being an inconsistent blogger. That's just how it is, I suppose.

Anyways, I decided to cook my mom lunch for mother's day, and must say that the recipes turned out to be a GREAT mix together.

I tried a new chicken dish, which I also did for a wedding shower I helped host Saturday night of this past weekend, though it was slightly adjusted for the wedding shower. Basically, I took this recipe and adjusted it a bit. Instead of goat cheese, I used cream cheese - partially because I couldn't find the goat cheese at the grocery store where I was and I refused to go to another, but also because in planning to use the recipe again to feed 25+ people at a shower, I thought a trial run with the *cheaper* cream cheese wouldn't be a bad idea. Also, for the shower, I used basil pesto because I didn't have the sun dried tomato pesto on Saturday. And it turned out fine, though the red color of the sun dried tomato looked a little better than the bright green basil pesto in the chicken. =)

So next, I made these sweet potatoes. YUM with the maple syrup. Perfect addition to the chicken. I found that they didn't need a whole lot of half/half or milk, but did add a VERY small amount of milk at the end.

To add some green to the plate - didn't your mom teach you that? - I made this asparagus recipe, and wow, it was one of my favorite ways I've eaten asparagus. I'd be interested to see what it would taste like steamed first, then skillet-ed in a LOT LESS oil/butter to be a little healthier. But it was definitely tasty just following the recipe.

For dessert (the most important part, of course), I made a flourless chocolate cake, which happened to be from my Healthy Cooking magazine. So it's healthy(er) and that makes me happy.

So, if you were trying to think of a plan for a slightly "nicer" dinner, this is a good one, and it isn't too very difficult. Including making a dessert and cooking time for everything, it was about 2 hours from the time that I started to when we were sitting down on to eat. And for the record - I think mom liked it. =)

Here's the recipe for the chicken typed out, since I adapted that recipe just a little:
Baked Chicken Stuffed with Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto, Basil, and CREAM Cheese
(6 servings)

6 boneless, skinless chicken breast
1/2 cup 100% whole wheat pastry flour
3 eggs, beaten well
2/3 cup 100% whole wheat bread crumbs
1/3 cup parmesan cheese
6 oz. cream cheese (I used the 1/3 less fat kind)
6 oz. Sun-dried tomato pesto
1/2 cup fresh basil, finely chopped (I didn't worry about chopping this extremely fine, and didn't really measure it - I just bought one package and used all of it)

Preheat oven to 350 F. Trim all visible fat and tendons from chicken breasts. Put chicken breasts, one at a time, inside a heavy plastic plastic freezer bag and pound with meat mallet or other heavy object until 1/4 inch thick.

Put pesto, cream cheese, and chopped basil in food processor and buzz a few times until mixture is combined but not completely blended. Spread 1/6 of pesto/basil/cheese mixture on each chicken breast. Roll up chicken, starting with smallest end, tucking in loose pieces and securing with two toothpicks. (Note: this part was pretty messy for me, as the mixture kept oozing out the sides. I adjusted how I was doing it as I went along, putting a little less on the chicken, or trying to keep it in the middle of the meat, but it was still messy enough.)

Put flour, beaten egg, and bread crumbs combined with parmesan cheese into three separate flat dishes. Roll each chicken breast, first in flour, then in egg, then in bread crumb/parmesan mixture. (Another note: this doesn't "roll" quite as easy as it sounds necessarily, but the crunchy addition of the chicken baked with the parm/bread mixture is worth it. Sometimes I put fresh whole wheat bread in my food processor and make my own fine bread crumbs and that works great.)

Spray glass casserole dish with nonstick spray and arrange chicken so pieces are not touching. Bake at 350 F for about 50-60 minutes, or until chicken is slightly browned and firm, but not hard to the touch. I recommend you start checking it after 40 minutes, and remove from oven as soon as the chicken feels firm and is slightly browned.


ENJOY!

signatureonblog

This entry was posted on Monday, May 17, 2010 at Monday, May 17, 2010 and is filed under , , , , , , . You can follow any responses to this entry through the comments feed .

0 comments

Post a Comment

<< Newer Post
Older Post >>