Stuffed Cypriot Chicken Breasts With Feta
- 4 whole chicken breasts with the bone and skin
- 8 sun dried tomatoes from a jar, finely chopped
- 1 bunch parsley a handfull, finely chopped
- 1 bunch basil a handfull, finely chopped
- 3 garlic cloves minced
- 2 tablespoons lemon zest
- 1 red chilli finely chopped, seeds removed, add more if you want it hotter
- 1 1/3 cups feta cheese
- olive oil
- sea salt
- pepper
- Take a big bowl and mix the sun-dried tomatoes, parsley, chilli, basil, lemon zest and garlic inside. Stir them well and crumble the Feta inside, mixing the products well again. Flavour with very little sea salt and enough black pepper, and stir again. Divide the stuffing into 4 equal portions and proceed to further preparations of the dish.
- Lay the chicken breasts on a plastic chopping board, with the skin side down. Use a knife to cut something like a pocket into the fillets. Fill the stuffing into the pocket of each chicken breast, press it a bit and fold the meat to cover it. If you want you can stick through the meat with rosemary springs to make sure the stuffing won't go out, but that is not obligatory if you manage to form good pockets.
- Heat up a deep pan and pour 2 glugs of olive oil in it. Put the meat in the pan with the skin side down. Cover the chicken bits with a wet piece of heat-proof paper. You have to crumble the paper under the tap to get it wet, and then to flatten it out to turn it into a lid. The wet paper will keep the moisture in the breasts and they will remain juicy on the inside. Fry until the skin gets a bit brown, then turn the breast over and cover with the wet piece of paper again. When you get a nice brown skin on the bottom side of the meat, turn the chicken bits with the skin side down again, cover with the paper and press with a heavy lid on top, so the skin makes full contact with the pan. The skin will get very crispy and delicious in not more than 2-3 minutes.
- When the dish is ready, take the chicken out on a wooden chopping board and cut each breast into nice 1 inch slices, so that the stuffing is visible. Squeeze about two tablespoons lemon juice into the pan where you cooked the chicken while it is still on the stove and stir to mix the flavours. Pour the juices over the chicken breast slices afterwards and you're done. You'll lick your fingers from delight! The chicken meat is soft and tender on the inside and crisp on the outside. It has a mild chilli flavour mixed with the sun-dried tomatoes and herbs. The Feta cheese adds an additional milky flavour which kills the hotness of the chilli, a little bit, together with the freshly ground lemon zest.
chicken breasts, tomatoes, parsley, basil, garlic, lemon zest, red chilli, feta cheese, olive oil, salt, pepper
Taken from www.yummly.com/recipe/Stuffed-Cypriot-Chicken-Breasts-with-Feta-1675423 (may not work)