Thursday, April 15, 2010

Foolproof Chicken Cordon Bleu

I made this tonight.  It was easy and SUPER tasty!  It'll be added to our rotation for sure.  I'm going to put in the entire recipe (it's from Cook's Country) - and at the end, I'll share what changes I made.

FP CCB serves 4 to 6

(To help prevent the filling from leaking, use large (8 ounce) chicken breasts and thoroughly chill the stuffed breasts before breading.  We like Black Forest ham here.)

25 Ritz crackers (about 3/4 sleeve)
4 slices hearty white sandwich bread, torn into pieces
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
8 thin slices deli ham (about 8 ounces - {see picture})
2 cups shredded Swiss cheese
4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (about 2 pounds total)
Salt & Pepper
3 large eggs
2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
1 cup all-purpose flour

1. Make Crumbs - Adjust oven racks to lowest and middle positions and heat oven to 450.  Pulse crackers and bread in food processor until coarsely ground.  Drizzle in butter, pulse to incorporate.  Bake crumbs on rimmed baking sheet on middle rack, stirring occasionally, until light brown, 3 to 5 minutes.  Transfer to shallow dish.  Leave oven on.

2. Stuff Chicken - Following photos 1 to 3, top each ham slice with 1/4 cup cheese and roll tightly; set aside. Pat chicken dry with paper towels. Cut pocket in thickest part of chicken and stuff each breast with 2 ham-and-cheese rolls. Season both sides of chicken with salt and pepper.  Transfer chicken to place, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate at least 20 minutes.

3. Toast and Bake - Beat eggs and mustard in second shallow dish.  Place flour in third shallow dish. One at a time, coat stuffed chicken lightly with flour, dip into egg mixture, and dredge in crumbs, pressing to adhere. (Breaded chicken can be refrigerated, covered, for 1 day.) Transfer chicken to clean baking sheet.  Bake on lowest rack until bottom of chicken is golden brown, about 10 minutes, and then move baking sheet to middle rack and reduce oven temperature to 400 degrees.  Bake until golden grown and chicken registers 160 degrees, 20 to 25 minutes.  Transfer to cutting board, tenet with foil, and let rest 5 minutes. Serve.

Here are the stuffing instructions.

Here's our finished product!  I did not make my own bread crumbs.  I used seasoned store bought.  I also didn't use Dijon mustard, just regular deli mustard we had in the fridge.  Because of that, I started preheating the oven about 5 minutes before the chicken was done chilling.  It turned out great!

3 comments:

Millie Motts said...

I was so excited about how easy this filling method looks. Can't wait to try it out!

Erika said...

Yummy! I may have to try that this weekend.

Erika said...

These were yummy! They end up being very LARGE-half of one is a good serving for me. I used panko instead of making my own breadcrumbs for convenience sake. Two thumbs up!