I love to cook, but I haven’t been made anything for a couple of weeks. I’m sure you are wondering what has this girl been eating? Frankly, I’m not sure myself – it’s been a lot of frozen meals and take out. However, this is not in line with my New Year’s resolutions, so I had to cook. Monday evening, I finally rustled up the energy to cook a meal for the week.
I had a leftover bag of fresh spinach and some chicken cutlets, so I wanted to find a recipe that involved those two (2) items. I ended up finding the above recipe online from Rachel Ray’s 30 Minute Meal via the Food Network. I modified the recipe a little and I took out the mushrooms because I didn’t have any in my fridge. Here is the recipe below along with some pictures that I took along the process. I really enjoyed making this meal and I would definitely make it again. Enjoy Ladies!
4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, 6 oz.
Lg. plastic food storage bags or waxed paper
1 package, 10 oz., frozen chopped spinach
2 tablespoons butter
12 small mushroom caps, crimini or button
2 cloves garlic, cracked
1 small shallot, quartered
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 cup part skim ricotta cheese
1/2 cup grated Parmigiano or Romano
1/2 teaspoon fresh grated or ground nutmeg
Toothpicks
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
Sauce:
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons flour
1/2 cup white wine
1 cup chicken broth
Directions:
Place breasts in the center of a plastic food storage bag or 2 large sheets of waxed paper. Pound out the chicken from the center of the bag outward using a heavy-bottomed skillet or mallet. Be firm but controlled with your strokes.
Defrost spinach in the microwave. Transfer spinach to a kitchen towel. Twist towel around spinach and wring it out until very dry. Transfer to a medium-mixing bowl. (I used fresh spinach since that's all I had in my fridge. I think you can use frozen or fresh spinach).
Place a nonstick skillet over moderate heat. When skillet is hot, add butter, mushrooms, garlic and shallot. Season with salt and pepper and sauté 5 minutes. Transfer mushrooms, garlic and shallot to the food processor. Pulse to grind the mushrooms and transfer to the mixing bowl, adding the processed mushrooms to the spinach. Add ricotta and grated cheese to the bowl and the nutmeg. Stir to combine the stuffing. Return your skillet to the stove over medium high heat. (I omitted the mushrooms and the nutmeg and added more garlic and shallots).
Place a mound of stuffing on each breast and wrap and roll breast over the stuffing. Secure breasts with toothpicks. Add 3 tablespoons oil to the pan, 3 turns of the pan. Add breasts to the pan and brown on all sides, cooking chicken 10 to 12 minutes. The meat will cook quickly because it is thin. Remove breasts; add butter to the pan and flour. Cook butter and flour for a minute, whisk in wine and reduce another minute. Whisk in broth and return breasts to the pan.
(I wasn't a big fan of the wine sauce. When I make this again,
I will use a standard chicken stock gravy).
Reduce heat and simmer until ready to serve. Remove toothpicks. Serve breasts whole or, remove from pan, slice on an angle and fan out on dinner plates. Top stuffed chicken breasts or sliced stuffed breasts with generous spoonfuls of the sauce.
(Here is a picture of my final meal with green beans and spinach for my sides).
