Daily Dinner Table
Ideas for dinner tonight. Household and kitchen tips, recipes, tweaks. What's worked great, and not so great.
Garden Chicken with Herbed Goat Cheese with Lemon Butter Caper Sauce
This is one of my favorites! It’s easy, looks great, and is really tasty. Again, I’m not much of a measurer. I’m a look and feel type of cook. Some dishes I can do measurements, but this one is totally individual. You’ll want a nice balance of flavors, and will want to have enough cheese to give the dish a nice creaminess and flavor. The order you put the items on isn’t tremendously important, but if you follow this order, it seems to stay in place nicely, and with the more moist ingredients on top, filter down to keep the whole thing moist and tender. Topping it off after baking with the lemon butter caper sauce finishes it off nicely enhances the flavors. As always, experiment! You might like to try different toppings. Mix and match. Have fun, and if you try something else and it turns out great, let me know. I’d like to try your version too!
You’ll need
boneless skinless chicken breasts
goat cheese, or herbed goat cheese (get the larger roll, or 2 small. I always use more than I think I want)
baby spinach
roasted red peppers
lemon/lemon juice
artichoke hearts, quartered
capers
basil leaves
sun-dried tomatoes or sun-dried tomato paste (much easier!)
butter
splash of white wine
olive oil, or oil of choice
Heat oven to 350.
Pound chicken breasts to make them uniformly about 1/2″ thick. I like to pound in a large plastic bag not all the way sealed, or between plastic wrap or waxed paper to keep from cross contaminating everything in the kitchen. It can be a little messy!
Heat about 1T of butter and a little olive oil in a pan over medium heat till melted and mixed, thinly coating the bottom of the pan. (adjust if you need more) Place pounded chicken breasts in pan and cook on one side until it is nicely browned. Turn over and cook for about a minute or two more. Set pan aside.
Spray a Pyrex dish large enough to hold all of the chicken placed side by side with Pam. Place chicken browned side up in Pyrex dish. Spread goat cheese generously over each piece. Place sun-dried tomatoes on top, or spread on the tomato paste. If you really like capers, put a sprinkling on top now, otherwise just leave them for the sauce. Place spinach leaves atop the tomato paste, and follow with slices of roasted red pepper. Top with artichoke hearts. Place in the pre heated oven and bake for about 20-30 minutes, or until the cheese softens, and it browns slightly.
While the chicken is baking, over medium heat, deglaze the pan used to par cook the chicken with a splash of wine, and about 2-3T of lemon juice. Add about 3T of butter, when melted add 1T of capers. Keep warm. (This is for about 3-4 servings, adjust for more or less)
When chicken is done, place on plate, pour a little of the lemon butter caper sauce atop. Garnish with a basil leaf.
This is great with sugar snap peas and garlic mashed potatoes. Shown here with roasted sweet potato… also good!
Daily Dinner Table 
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