Saturday, January 30, 2010

I’m Back! And With Almond-Meal Encrusted Baked Stuffed Chicken

I had a crazybusycrazy week. I missed keeping up with everyone’s blogs and making my own random contributions! But I’m back online, and am reporting on the almond meal experiment.

I made almond milk last week and was left with a good bit of almond meal, a byproduct of the milk-making. I was excited to experiment with using the almond meal! I decided to coat chicken with it and bake the chicken, sort of an oven-fried chicken experience. And I thought while I was experimenting already, why not stuff the chicken breasts? It only took a few minutes to make the stuffing and put the whole thing together to bake. Here is the process and the result:

Stuffing: I ended up using a cup of chopped cooked broccoli and three Laughing Cow cheese wedges, with a little garlic.



Smash ‘em up.



Then for the assembly. I seasoned the almond meal with salt and pepper. I like to keep it simple when I’m cooking with something new, since I don’t really know what kind of flavor I am working with.



Slice a pouch in the side of the chicken breast and push in a couple tablespoons of the stuffing. Dip the stuffed breast in beaten egg, place in almond meal, flip the chicken to coat both sides, then place in baking dish. Drizzle with olive oil and bake. I know I set the oven at 425 but I have no idea how long I baked it. I’m terrible at that part! I just check it after 25 minutes or so, then check it every 5 or 10 minutes until it looks done.

Here’s a blurry picture where I am trying to show you a cross-section of the stuffed bird parts. You can almost make out the filling. I need to work on my zoom technique instead of just leaning in really close to take a picture!



Verdict: yummo! It could have been a little moister. Next time I’ll cover the chicken for the first 20 minutes or so of baking, then remove the cover and crank the heat to brown the coating.

5 comments:

Anonymous Fat Girl said...

Oh my that looks fabulous! I love your recipes and food ideas. It gives me new things to try! (My husband loves them too) :)

liz said...

aww thanks! i still have maybe half a cup of meal left, i might put it in some oatmeal.
and i bought more almonds! more milk-makin' in my near future!

Mary - A Merry Life said...

That does look fabulous.

Just read your last post as well. Don't worry too much about that. 15 lost in no time! You can do it. ;)

Cammy@TippyToeDiet said...

Ooh, thank you! I may try that this week. I need to do something different with chicken than barbecue it. :) I might also try it with fish, for that southern "fish fry" experience.

liz said...

@mary, thanks!
@cammy, i bet that would be good! let me know :)