What if I could give you a stuffed chicken recipe that has no rolling, no twine, no pounding with the mallet, and best of all – no hassle! This easy dinner recipe will fit the bill. The chicken breasts are sliced accordion style and then stuffed with spinach and cheeses. Then it’s topped with tomato sauce and mozzarella, and put under the broiler to get brown and goey.
This recipe is based off a chicken recipe that a family member taught me. She would use thinly sliced chicken breasts to make a stuffed rollatini. The pieces were breaded and baked before being topped with sauce and cheese. I still love that recipe and can recall the creamy filling from memory, but I wanted to make a version that was less fussy. That’s when I thought of hasselback chicken!
Best I can tell, hasselback foods originate with a special preparation of potatoes. I have no idea who made the original hasselback chicken recipe, but I love it every time I see different versions pop up on Pinterest. The stuffed and sliced chicken breasts look so fancy, but you know it’s easy to prepare.
Whip this up for a decadent weeknight meal.
Yields 6 servings of Hasselback Marinara Chicken
The Preparation
- 4 ounces cream cheese
- 1/3 cup mozzarella cheese, shredded
- 10 ounces frozen spinach, thawed and drained
- 816 grams boneless, skinless chicken breast
- salt and pepper, to taste
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 2/3 cup low-carb tomato sauce, such as Rao's
- 3 ounces fresh mozzarella cheese, sliced
The Execution
1. Pre-heat your oven to 400°F. Place the cream cheese, mozzarella, and spinach in a microwave safe bowl. Heat for about 2 minutes, or until the cheeses get melty and can be easily mixed together. Mix the filling and add salt and pepper to taste.
2. Cut several horizontal slices across each chicken breast, Cut as deeply as you can without slicing all the way through the chicken. Season the chicken with salt and pepper.
3. Stuff each piece of chicken with the cheese filling.
4. Brush some olive oil onto the bare chicken tops. Cook for 25 minutes, or until chicken reaches 165°F.
5. Change your oven to the broil setting. Top with Rao’s tomato sauce, and the slices of mozzarella.
6. Broil for 5 minutes, or until the cheese gets melty and starts to brown.
This makes a total of 6 servings of Hasselback Marinara Chicken. Each serving comes out to be 390 calories, 18.4g fats, 3g net carbs, and 49.9g protein.
| NUTRITION | CALORIES | FAT | CARBS | FIBER | NET CARBS | PROTEIN |
| 4 ounce cream cheese | 388 | 38.6 | 4.7 | 0 | 4.7 | 7 |
| 1/3 cup mozzarella cheese | 111 | 8.3 | 0.8 | 0 | 0.8 | 8.2 |
| 10 ounce frozen spinach | 82 | 1.6 | 11.9 | 8.2 | 3.7 | 10.3 |
| 816 gram boneless, skinless chicken breast | 1346 | 29.4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 253 |
| — salt and pepper | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 1 tablespoon olive oil | 119 | 13.5 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2/3 cup low-carb tomato sauce | 39 | 0.3 | 9.5 | 2.5 | 7.1 | 2.1 |
| 3 ounce fresh mozzarella cheese | 255 | 19 | 1.9 | 0 | 1.9 | 18.9 |
| Totals | 2341 | 110.7 | 28.8 | 10.7 | 18.1 | 299.4 |
| Per Serving (/6) | 390 | 18.4 | 4.8 | 1.8 | 3 | 49.9 |
Hasselback Marinara Chicken
Ingredients
- 4 ounce cream cheese
- ⅓ cup mozzarella cheese shredded
- 10 ounce frozen spinach thawed and drained
- 816 gram boneless, skinless chicken breast
- salt and pepper to taste
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- ⅔ cup low-carb tomato sauce such as Rao's
- 3 ounce fresh mozzarella cheese sliced
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400F. Place the cream cheese, mozzarella, and spinach in a microwave-safe bowl. Heat for about 2 minutes, or until the cheeses are soft and melted. Mix to combine and add salt and pepper to taste.
- Cut several horizontal slices across each chicken breast, cutting as deeply as possible without slicing all the way through the chicken. Season with salt and pepper.
- Stuff each piece of chicken with the cheese filling.
- Brush the olive oil over the bare chicken tops. Cook for 25 minutes, or until the chicken reaches 165F. Remove from oven.
- Turn on the broiler and top the chicken with tomato sauce and fresh mozzarella.
- Broil for 5 minutes, or until the cheese is melted and beginning to brown. Remove from the oven and serve.
Winner winner chicken dinner! Well, lunch(es) actually. Made this on Sunday for our lunches and its been great! I used chop sticks as a guide when slicing the chicken so I wouldn’t go all the way through. Thanks for the recipe!
Just made this last night and it is amazing!! I normally hate chicken breasts ( i prefer thighs) but this was not dry and was soo good, definitely a repeat meal!!
I have made this for dinner the last 3 Sunday. It’s delicious and I’m obsessed. I eat it for lunch with broccoli or over spaghetti squash (with butter) Yum!!!
by FAR the best recipe I have found on here so far, and I have found a TON of great things to cook. I can’t make enough of this, as my wife and I both LOVE it.
This looks SO good! Can’t wait to try it! Can you give me an idea of how much of the cheese mixture goes in each chicken breast?
There will be roughly 2 cups of the mixture, so about half a cup per chicken.
Hi there i am new to Keto and the Raos’ sauce i have a bit of trouble finding is there any other sauce that could be put in??
Sure! There are a few options at the markets these days. Read the ingredient labels and try to find one with no added sugar. Raos is usually about 1-3 net carbs for 1/4 cup. Just try and find something similar.
Thank you so much your awesome 🙂
Thank you for this recipe, love it! So much easier than doing a rollatini!
I bet this would be good with prosciutto.
Yum!
Silly question how is this 6 servings with 3 chicken breast? told ya it’s silly 🙂
Most chicken breasts are really 2 servings because of their size. (If you have a small chicken this might not be accurate for you.)
A whole breast is 2 fillets (2 halves)
Made this tonight and WOW. It was so yummy and filling! Thanks for this receipe!!!
Excellent! The whole family LOVED it!!! I’ll be making this again soon! So EASY!
I’m so glad they liked it!
So, I am not big on vegetables at all. And when making this I thought, “this is going to be way to much spinach for me to choke down”. Well I am in love with this meal. I ate all of it and the spinach. the only thing different is I used Gustare Vita Tomato Basil Pasta Sauce, which was really good. I choose this sauce because my local store didn’t have Rao’s, And this was the better choice out of the other 6 going off the nutritional facts. Thank you for this recipe.
I’m really happy you found a recipe you enjoy the vegetables inside of! Keep finding more of those and you won’t have to worry about vegetables ever again 🙂
So, I’m guessing that I’m in the vast minority here, but this was way too “spinachy” for me, completely overpowered everything else. I’m thinking of trying again, but using fresh spinach this time instead of frozen. Anyone else tried that yet?