Ricotta chicken

I had the pleasure of having my sister-in-law Kara and my niece and nephew stay with me for a week recently and so was able to cook for more than just myself a few times, which was a nice treat! I was flipping through my magazines in a hurry before heading to the shops and saw the basis for this meal in the express section. Unfortunately, it wasn't quite as express as I was hoping for, and we ended up eating at about 10:30! Never mind, it was mostly due to Kara and I chatting away and not paying all that much attention to dinner!!

The recipe is based off a Donna Hay recipe, but I've added a few extra ingredients, simply as I had them on hand to be used, but now I wouldn't make it any other way!

Ingredients

200g fresh ricotta

150g marscapone (was an experiment that went very right!)

4 tablespoons grated parmesan

1 teaspoon cinnamon (again, worth adding!)

4 tablespoons of shredded fresh basil

3 chicken breasts, with the skin still on

Cherry tomatoes

Extra fresh basil to put in the pan

Method:

1. Combine the ricotta, marscapone, parmesan and cinnamon in a bowl and mix well. 

2. Add in the basil, which I added only half at a time as I wasn't sure if I wanted it all in. I did. 

3. The ricotta mixture will now look like so...

4. Carefully peel the skin back from the chicken breast, keeping one side still attached, creating a pillow. You want to stuff the ricotta mix into this pouch. 

5. Brown each side for about 4 minutes in a heavy based pan (mine starting being a little messy, but it didn't really matter). Once they have browned, add chopped cherry tomatoes and fresh basil and bake in the oven for approximately half an hour.

6. In the meantime, I should have had the vegetables on at the same time cooking away, but I was a little disorganised, so things took a little longer. Prepare whatever vegetables you wish to accompany the chicken with and have it in the oven for as long as required, aiming to be ready with the chicken. I had some coriander in the fridge so shredded some and added it to my potato and pumpkin prior to baking.

7. Once the chicken is cooked all the way through, it should all be golden, with crispy skin. Be sure to spoon any of the sauce in the pan over the chicken to get the tomato juice and other goodness further infusing through the chicken. It was really, really tasty. Not exactly an express meal, but it was fairly straight-forward, and was delicious! 

I have a few more posts on food I've cooked while family have been here, which I now have a bit more time to share and write up! Back to cooking for one now though as my family have left and Pete returns to London for work. If I was posting every day at the moment you'd be seeing a whole lot of scrambled eggs with avocado!