Thursday, August 9, 2007

Royal Foodie Joust-September 2007

Every month, Jenn from the Leftover Queen hosts The Royal Foodie Joust. Each contestant is given three ingredients they must use to create a recipe that is competition-worthy for the title of Royal Foodie Joust Winner. This month's Royal Foodie Joust ingredients are chipotle, zucchini and buttermilk, as chosen by August 1, 2007's winnder marye from Apron Strings and Simmering Things. I was a bit daunted by this challenge, there were so many possiblities, and I wanted my creation to be creative, different, and most of all, tasty!

I've never cooked with chipotle before, but after this challenge, I feel I'll be adding this to my cooking repertoire for Latin foods from now on. I loved the smoky flavor, with the nice lip-smacking bite it leaves in your mouth.

I decided to go with stuffed chicken breasts, seeing as how I've never tried stuffing chicken breasts before, but thought it would really bring out the zucchini flavors. So, without further ado, here's my recipe for Zucchini Stuffed Chicken Breasts with a Buttermilk Chipotle Sauce:

For the chicken:
-4 skinless chicken breasts, halved
-1 zucchini, sliced thin
-1/2 cup sliced cheddar
-salt and pepper
-toothpicks to hold the breast together, should you need it

For the sauce:
-1 eight oz can of chipotle chiles in adobo sauce
-1/2 cup buttermilk
-4 oz. plain yogurt
-salt and pepper

Instructions: Preheat oven to 375F. In a medium saucepan over low heat, combine the ingredients for the sauce. I added about a half tablespoon of lime juice, but you can opt out of that, I'm just a freak about lime. Line a 13" x 9" pan with tin foil. Cut a slit in the center of each chicken breast half and stuff it with your desired amount of cheese and zucchini (I layered mine so I had two pieces each of the zucchini and cheese). I had some extra zucchini leftover, and knew I'd be using toothpicks to hold them together while they cooked, so I topped each breast half with a slice of zucchini and stuck the toothpick through that. Continue until each breast half is complete and place them in the lined pan. Bake for 30-40 minutes or until the breasts are cooked through. Once they're done, pour the chipotle sauce over them.
I thought these turned out really, really well. The chipotle was far too spicy for me, so I ended up scraping the actual pepper pieces off, but kept the red sauce. My husband LOVED them, he's the king of all things spicy-hot. He even said to me, "Look how much you made me sweat... that's a good thing!" My little brother loved how they looked when they were plated, but was not a fan of the chipotle (spicy foods upset his stomach), but he was more than happy with the chicken without the sauce. I was especially happy that these made enough for me to bring for dinner tomorrow night when I stand duty.

I'll be posting the link for you to vote for yours truly after September 1st, which is when voting is available. I hope I get your vote! Thanks!
~Mehgan~


13 comments:

Anonymous said...

wow, Mehgan, those look really awesome!
You should check out the Blueberry Bundt cake with blueberry balsamic & chipotle reduction I posted 8/8 on http://bakingdelights.com
Chipotle..It's what's for dinner ... :)

Deborah said...

These look fantastic!! I have actually seen many recipes that use the chipotle in adobo sauce, and say to take out the chipotles and just use the sauce unless you like it really hot!

Jennifer said...

I've never thought about stuffing chicken breasts- I'll have to play around with that sometime! Thanks for the idea!

You've been tagged!

Anonymous said...

That looks amazing! Great creativity!

Anonymous said...

I love spicy hot dishes--and these look phenomenal! Thanks for the recipe! :)

bcmomtoo said...

These look amazing! A couple of us in this house would love them. We love hot stuff, and the flavor of chipotle. And I have plenty of zucchini right now.

Valerie Harrison (bellini) said...

What a creative way to use the 3 ingredients of buttermilk, zucchini and chipotle!!!Isn't blogging fun!!!!!

BC said...

This looks absolutely delicious. It's a great idea.

Dharm said...

Mehgan
These look really delicious! It reminds me of a Chicken Cordon Bleu except that these look and sound so much more delish. Well done!

Dolores said...

Um... Yum! These look like a winner to me.

Anonymous said...

I've put this on next weeks menu plan!

Thanks

Anonymous said...

I made it last night, but without the sauce. My eldest daughter had it, too. Hubby (Chef) thoroughly enjoyed it. Next time I'll make the sauce.

Thankyou for helping me to please a very fussy man! Lol

Nicole said...

This chicken looks sooo delish. Congrats on your win! I love your blog btw.