pesto parm chicken

I had looked at Ellyn Satter's "Secrets of Feeding a Healthy Family" as more of an academic text for my work with clients and as a speaker. I recommend it all the time to parents who are struggling with cooking or feeding, who struggle with feeding themselves well, or "hate" or feel intimidated by cooking. Family meals really matter that much, and this is the best resource I have yet seen to help make that happen.

Though I am am a regular and competent cook, I realized I had fallen into having a handful of meals or variants over and over. That's been fine (see my list of 60 recipes) but I needed to remind myself there are other ways to have potatoes than mashed!

I've started experimenting with Ellyn's recipes. From meatloaf (yummy) to roasted veggies and potatoes (also yummy!) Here was the standout. Clio's parm chicken. SOOOOO good! It was easy, smelled amazing and tasted even better. I served with boiled broccoli, noodles and a pseudo ratatouille (sliced onion, zucchini and tomato sauce with Italian herbs and garlic.) 4 year old M loved it too, and didn't even ask for ketchup (high praise!!)

Pesto Parm Chicken (Satter)

6 boneless, skinless chicken breasts halves, about 1 1/2 pounds (I used 3 halves for our family and still had leftovers...)

1 1/2 cups grated parm or Romano or Asiago (about 6 ounces)

6 Tbspns pesto (look for basil as the first ingredient)

(I had extra pesto since I used less chicken)

preheat oven to 425

Mix 2 Tbspns grated cheese with 6 Tbspns pesto. Rub or pat mixture onto chicken until light even coating. Sprinkle remaining cheese into a plate. Press both sides of the chicken into the cheese to form a coating. You might need to refresh your plate of cheese, careful not to contaminate the cheese after handling the raw chicken...

Place chicken into a baking dish and bake for 25 minutes or until internal temp is 165 degrees F

Let me know how it goes!