Chicken Breasts Stuffed with Feta Cheese, Sun-dried Tomatoes, Spinach, and Mushrooms

The Finished Product

Our friends, Rick and Karen, joined us last weekend for a Kitchen Inventions dinner – we really enjoy experimenting with these friends, ’cause we’ve known them forever. That means, they will tell us if the dinner is “Yuck” or if it passes the KI (“Kitchen Inventions”) test. This one definitely passed the test…so without further ado, here goes:

 

• 3-4 chicken breasts (we used 3 large ones, and had leftovers…yum!)
• 2-3 tbsp. sun-dried tomatoes, cut into small pieces (not the ones packed in oil)
• 1/2 c. diced mushrooms, sautéed
• 1 c. spinach, sautéed in small amount of olive oil with dash of crushed red pepper flakes, with zest of 1/2 lemon and juice of 1/2 lemon added at the end of cooking (Save the other lemon half – we’ll use it later on the chicken breasts for zest and slices)
• 1/3 c. feta cheese, crumbled
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• Salt and Pepper to taste (not a lot of salt, as the feta is fairly salty)
• 1 tsp. Oregano
• Parsley for garnish

Saute spinach as described above. Set spinach aside in a small bowl to cool. Meanwhile, saute mushrooms, and set aside to cool. Once the spinach is cool, squeeze out excess liquid, then chop spinach into small pieces. Combine mushrooms and spinach in bowl, add feta cheese, sun-dried tomatoes, oregano, garlic, salt and pepper. Stir gently to combine.

Cut a slit horizontally in the chicken breast (form a “pocket” – do not slice completely through). Take 1/3 or 1/4 of the above mixture (depending on whether you have 3 or 4 breasts) and place it in the pocket. Place the chicken breast on a piece of foil, large enough to enclose the chicken breast and make a small sealed packet for cooking.

Some assembly required...plus it's hard to make raw chicken "photogenic"...

Sprinkle a small amount of salt and pepper on the top of chicken breast. Zest remaining 1/2 lemon and divide zest evenly on top of each breast. Next, slice that “zestless” 1/2 lemon and place 2 thin slices on top of each breast.  Pour 1 Tbsp. of broth on top of each breast. Fold up the foil, so that you form a tight packet, making sure you seal all of the edges to keep the steam inside the packet. Place the chicken packet on a baking sheet.  Continue with the remaining chicken breasts.

 

 

Foil wrapped and ready for the oven

Place the baking sheet in a pre-heated 425 degree oven. Bake for 20 minutes.

Remove the baking sheet and allow the chicken to cool for about 4 minutes. CAREFULLY unfold the foil. Be sure you don’t get a steam bath while you open the packet…Place each breast on a cutting board, and slice into 3-4 angled pieces each. How pretty does THAT look on top of angel hair pasta??? With a side of sautéed rainbow swiss chard??

Once cooled, almost ready to slice.

Garnish with a little parsley (if that is what you used in your pasta like we did…it’s simply cooked and drained angel hair pasta, olive oil heated in a small saucepan, with a cut up clove of garlic in it, and parsley added to the oil – then all stirred into the drained pasta….super simple and tasty!)

So easy, so healthy, and really looks pretty on the plate. Buon Appetito!

Oh, did we mention that Molly came over, too? This is what she had for dinner….By the way, Molly’s coming back over this Friday night so we can DogSit…pictures of Molly will surely be added to this post soon thereafter….Have a good rest of the week, and “see” you soon!

Molly’s Dinner – “DogScargo”

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