CHICKEN CORDON BLUE
INGREDIENTS:
6 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
12 thin slices Deli Ham
12 thin slices Swiss cheese
1/4 cup chopped parsley
1 cup bread crumbs
1/4 cup all-purpose flour for sauce
1 teaspoon Kosher salt
1 teaspoon black pepper, freshly ground
2 teaspoons fresh chopped thyme leaves or dry
1 teaspoon paprika
1 cup heavy whipping cream
1/2 cup dry white wine (optional)
2 cups chicken broth
Onion powder (to taste) optional
Garlic powder (to taste) optional
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lay chicken breast between 2 pieces of
plastic wrap or a freezer bag and using flat side of a meat mallet,
gently pound the chicken breast pieces to about 1/4 inch thickness.
Salt and pepper each chicken breast and sprinkle with chopped parsley. Place two slices of Deli ham
and 1 slice of Swiss cheese on each breast within 1/2 inch of the edges.
Roll each breast up tightly like a jellyroll starting at the long side and
secure with toothpicks. Season the bread crumbs with salt, black
pepper, thyme and paprika and spread onto waxed paper or a flat pan.
Dip each chicken breast into the beaten eggs and evenly coat with the
seasoned bread crumbs. Spray a 13x9x2 baking dish with no-stick
cooking spray, Pam or
equivalent
and arrange chicken beast with the seam side down and bake for 30
to 35 minutes until golden brown and cooked through.
Combine chicken broth and wine in a non-stick skillet and bring to a boil
and reduce heat to low.
In a separate bowl, mix flour and whipping cream and slowly add to the broth
and wine mixture and cook until thick. If necessary, add more chicken
broth to thin. Season with salt and fresh ground black pepper. Add
onion and/or garlic powder to taste if desired.Remove toothpicks from
chicken and cut into pinwheels. Pour the white wine sauce over chicken
and serve while warm. Serve with a side of home made mash potatoes and
green vegetable of your choice.
Note: If using small
chicken breast, you will only need 1 slice of Swiss cheese per chicken
breast but the chicken breast that I used were on steroids or something and
needed the extra slice of Swiss cheese to cover them. Also, you can
use only 4 chicken breast instead of 6 and use the same amounts of other
ingredients listed above. You need very thin slices of Swiss cheese,
otherwise you can't roll the chicken breast very tight...I learned on this
one.
Historical information concerning this
recipe:
Chicken
Cordon
Bleu
is a French-inspired poultry dish, although evidence suggests that
Chicken
Cordon
Bleu
was actually developed in the United States by chefs imitating other stuffed
meat dishes from Europe. The name of the dish is clearly of French origin –
Cordon
Bleu
means “blue ribbon” in French, and in French culinary tradition, the
Cordon
Bleu
is awarded to food or chefs of particularly high quality.
This recipe is fairly generic on the web and our
Adcock Family Traditions Cookbook circa 1997 has a very close recipe to this
one. This is a good representation of French style cuisine with the
white wine sauce even if an ole Southern boy prepared the dish.....grin if
you must!
The
white wine sauce covers up the pinwheel pattern of the chicken but sequence
pixs below will show the chicken jellyroll in closer detail.
This is a great dish and very easy to do but does take a little extra time.
Can you say "beautimous out loud?" The blue pattern striped
dish set was purchased just to highlight this recipe. Now if that is
not a case of complete domestication, there aren't any oil wells in Odessa,
Texas! Above served with Joyce's Cream
Cheese Mashed Potatoes, broccoli and cheese, toss salad and garlic toast
and drinks of choice.
Below pixs of Chicken Cordon Bleu baked on 02-12-09
using thin sliced Pastrami instead of the Deli Ham simply because I was out
of the sliced Deli ham and used what I had on hand without making a fast
trip to the Super Market.
Above pix
before slicing...I didn't let it cool down very long...must have been hungry
for sure!
What a beautiful contrast between the Pastrami, Swiss Cheese, Fresh Chopped
Parsley and Chicken...can you say Beautimous? The seasoned bread
crumbs baked to a golden brown color.
I guarantee you that Prosciutto Ham
would be outstanding with this recipe instead of regular Deli ham and will
give it a try in the near future.
Click on the below thumbnails for
a larger view:
I left out a couple pixs of dipping the rolled chicken breast into the
beaten eggs and rolling in the seasoned bread crumbs and it wasn't because
of the "mess", I brain locked again....another grin is in order
This is a very fun recipe and according to my bride, "It was wonderful"
of which I concur as well.
Bill aka Mickey Porter 01-04-09
