Baked Chicken Recipes

There’s not much better comfort food than a whole chicken recipe - and this is one that is super easy and out of this world delicious!  The key to this – and all other whole chicken recipes, in my opinion – is the blast of high heat that the chicken gets when it goes in the oven.  This automatically starts crisping up the skin which in turn keeps all the juices inside the bird.

Feel free to make your own changes to this whole chicken recipe by using the spices and seasonings that you and your family like.  If you are not a lemon lover,  just skip that part.

Chicken and rice recipes (or turkey) are always good comfort food.  Since Thanksgiving is here and many of us will have leftover turkey this week, I thought I would include a nice stuff squash recipe.  What a nice festive Autumn meal this makes, with pecans, turkey, wild rice and acorn squash.    I like to try to find acorn squash that are small enough that each person gets their own, but larger ones will work fine, as well.

First take four small acorn squash and cut a slice off the bottom so that they stand straight up in your foil-lined baking pan.  Bake at 350 degrees until tender – about an hour.

photo credit: .Larry Page

This is one of the more unique chicken and rice recipes in my arsenal.  It is called Country Captain and it originated in India.  It found its way to the United States back in the 1700’s when sailors sailed back and forth over the spice routes.

When President Roosevelt was in Warm Springs, Georgia getting treatment for his polio, he invited General Patton to have dinner with him.  His chef served them Country Captain and they absolutely loved it.  President Roosevelt brought national recognition to this dish and it is frequently served  all over the state of Georgia.

photo credit: HiMalta

When it comes to baked chicken breast recipes, you can’t find one more elegant than the classy Chicken Kiev – where the herb butter center is the star of the show.  It always impresses and brings on the “ooohs and aaahhs”.  Given the name, one would assume this dish originated in the Ukraine, right?  Nyet!  It was invented by a French chef named Appert.  The name was actually used in many New York restaurants who were trying to get the business of the many Russian immigrants in the area.  This dish is also called “Chicken Supreme” in many places, but no matter what you call it, it is a special treat!

photo credit: eyeSPIVE

This chicken casserole is a lighter version of the traditional Greek dish Pastitsio – which is more commonly made with ground lamb or ground beef.  It is every bit as delicious and Pastitsio lovers won’t even notice that it is chicken, but it will be a healthier meal.

Although many different pastas are used in the many variations on  a Pastitsio recipe, we are going to use 6 ounces of elbow macaroni.  That is about 1 1/2 cups.  So boil this in salted water until just done and drain.  Now stir in a beaten egg, 1/3 cup of Parmesan cheese and 1/4 cup of milk.  Set this aside while we make the filling for our chicken casserole.

When I make this baked chicken recipe, I never know if I should call it cannelloni or manicotti.  In the United States, the dish is most often called manicotti.  That is what you will see most frequently on Italian restaurant menus.  Some people will tell you they are the same.  Some will say that the pasta is rolled differently for the two.  I grew up thinking that manicotti was usually stuffed with a primarily cheese mixture, while cannelloni usually had more of a hearty meat filling.  Either way, they are both delicious tubes of pasta that are filled with something savory, covered with red sauce,  and baked in the oven.

photo credit: stu_spivack

When I wanted to make a baked chicken breast recipe recently, I decided to do Teriyaki.  I had boneless chicken, so this was sort of an experiment.  I usually make Teriyaki with bone-in thighs, but I thought I’d give it a try this way.  It came out so delicious, that I just had to post it.

photo credit: laudu

I have tweaked an old chicken slow cooker recipe with some of the ingredients that I love in Satay.  Satay sounds like such an exotic dish.  In some ways it is.  It comes from far away places and combines ingredients not usually put together in Western cuisines.  It seems that Indonesia is actually considered to be the country that developed Satay.  It is actually nothing more than some sort of meat skewered on little bamboo sticks and grilled.  However, the spicy peanut sauce is what makes us perk up and smile when we get that first taste of good Satay.  Satay is a favorite of street vendors in many parts of the far east.

When I think about boneless chicken recipes, I think back to my days in graduate school at Michigan State University.  There was this tiny Mexican restaurant right near campus.  There was always a line and the restaurant was under ground.  So we would wait our turns standing on the sidewalk until we were called to descend the narrow stairs down into the restaurant.  I never needed to look at the menu, because I always ordered the same thing – Enchiladas Suisas!  Oh my, were they delicious.  I have two versions of this recipe.  This one is the simpler of the two and I will just call this one Green Chile Chicken Enchiladas.  I will be posting my very favorite Enchiladas Suisas recipe in the near future.