This blog has been long overdue for a recipe. It isn’t for lack of wanting to share and there are an abundance of recipes I have ready to post. Somehow life has just got a bit crazy and we haven’t been home very much lately which means I haven’t been cooking. Boy did I miss it! I love cooking so much that when we moved to Chicago my main request was a nice kitchen. I love to spend time in there trying out new meals and especially desserts. A few weeks ago I threw this meal together using some of the ingredients we had left in our refrigerator. It was as big a hit as it was easy. Even better, it is pretty healthy. Last night I paired it with a simple green salad topped with my favorite homemade lemon mustard vinaigrette. I added my usual go to accompaniment of roasted asparagus because I just love its detoxifying qualities. While the chicken baked I just drizzled the asparagus with a tad of truffle oil and some sea salt and put it in the oven for about 20 minutes.
Pesto Baked Chicken
Ingredients:
1 package of organic chicken tenderloins (about a half pound to a pound)
Eggs (I used Egg Beaters because it is simple)
Italian seasoned bread crumbs (panko works well too)
Small jar of pesto
1/4 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
Directions:
Turn oven to 350º and coat a baking dish with spray. Side note: I found coconut oil cooking spray at Trader Joe’s and I about started jumping up and down in the store. Place egg whites and bread crumbs in separate bowls. Dredge tenderloins in eggs and then in breadcrumbs. Make sure they are evenly coated and then place in baking dish.
Place a spoonful of pesto over each tenderloin. Once you have pesto on each piece of chicken spread the pesto evenly with a spoon. Don’t do this until you have put all the pesto on the chicken, you don’t want to put the spoon back in the jar once it has touched the chicken because of cross contamination.
Place in oven and bake for 20-25 minutes. Pull the chicken out 5 minutes before it is done and spread cheese over the chicken. Continue baking until the chicken is done and the cheese has melted.
Fresh Salad With Lemon Mustard Vinaigrette
Ingredients:
Fresh salad mix
1 red onion thinly sliced
Goat cheese
1 lemon
1 tbsp. olive oil
1 tbsp. apple cider vinegar
2 tbsp. mustard
(You can also add a bit of minced garlic to this but I forgot it!)
Directions:
Place salad mix and sliced red onion along with a tablespoon of goat cheese on a plate.
Mix together the juice of one lemon, olive oil, vinegar and mustard. Drizzle over salad.
We topped our salads with the baked chicken and it was a delicious combination. This dinner is a great combo of healthy carbs, fresh greens, and healthy protein. The dressing has just enough healthy fat to help your body absorb the nutrients of the salad but isn’t full of excess fats or calories.
You can have this dinner done in less than a half an hour and it is pretty budget friendly to feed a family, or a small army! This is a guilt free meal you can have for lunch or dinner.
That lemon vinaigrette sounds yummy! I am totally trying this out next week for my meal prep! Thanks for sharing 🙂
It really is delicious and so easy. Try it with garlic too.
This sounds great, and a perfect use for the 3/4 jar of pesto I have leftover in the fridge!
That is exactly why I made it in the first place! I ended up buying another jar to make more 🙂
I love love love pesto – and am so glad it is asparagus season! I can’t get enough!
I was thinking of you when I made this and wondering if I could do something similar with tofu?
Yeah, I definitely think so! Baked tofu is actually one of my favorite things too!
Interesting. I might give it a try.
I will be trying this! Thanks for posting it. I could eat a shoe with pesto on it! lol
I agree. It is amazing stuff!
My mouth is watering. I’ll try this over the weekend, I just gotta prepare the pesto from scratch.
Looks delish! I recently made homemade pesto. I didn’t realize pine nuts were so expensive. I also used a mixture of basil and spinach.
I know they really are expensive. I keep meaning to make it to. I even have the mortar and pestle to do it. The mixture of spinach and basil sounds so good. I wonder what a pesto taco would be like?!
They taste great! (we have a couple taco joints here that make em!)
OMG we had pesto chicken (grilled) last week. SOOO good! I took leftover chicken to top my salad for lunch the next day, but made the mistake of forgetting to bring mints, gum, or ANYTHING to get rid of that garlicy pesto breath. Sorry coworkers…
So good over salad! Grilled sounds really good. Once it ever warms up here I will have to try that.
This recipe looks great! I’m always looking for more interesting ways to cook chicken and the breaded plus pesto and cheese combo sounds amazing.
It really is. Tastes like it shouldnt be healthy.
Wow! This looks great! I really adore goat cheese on just about anything! 🙂
I’m definitely sending this recipe to my husband (he’s the resident cook in the house) because that vinaigrette looks yummy.
Oh it really is. So simply and a great combination. Enjoy!