Chicken Pinwheels

I had to look HARD this week or a recipe that I wanted to make. I'm suffering from "lack of motivation to do anything lately" syndrome. It'll pass, but it's making feeling excited about cooking hard right now. I did actually cook for last week's challenge, but I was suffering from "lack of motivation to post about it" syndrome. It'll go up at some point in the future, because the pictures are sitting here staring me in the face saying "Why didn't you love me enough to post about me?"

Anyhow, now that that blathering is out of the way I'll get to the point! I made Michael Symon's Chicken Pinwheels for the FNCCC this week. I had my eyebrows raised at some of the ingredients (pickles?) but decided to go for it. The recipe is for 8, but I only cooked for the two of us.

Ingredients

8 boneless skinless chicken breasts
6 ounces sliced ham
8 ounces smoked bacon
4 eggs beaten
3 diced pickles (dill, sweet, or sours, your preference)
1/2 cup butter
3 tablespoons flour
2 cups chicken stock
2 tablespoons chopped tarragon (I used dried and added it into the sauce before putting things in the oven instead of as a garnish at the end)

Directions

Place chicken in between plastic wrap and pound out until 1/4-inch thick (I rather enjoy using my meat mallet for such things). Place 1 slice of ham and 1 slice of bacon onto each breast of chicken. Lightly scramble the eggs and let cool. Divide eggs evenly over chicken and spread out. Top with diced pickles and roll into pinwheels. Once chicken is rolled, tie with string to secure (Unwaxed dental floss or... undyed cotton crochet thread works if you don't have kitchen twine). Heat the butter in a saute pan and brown chicken rolls. Remove chicken rolls from the pan and set aside. Add flour to the same saute pan, and cook until light brown. Add the chicken stock, making sure to stir out any lumps. Return chicken to pan and place in a preheated 350 degree oven for 1 hour (I think 1 hour is too long. It might've been because I was only baking two rolls, but I took them out after about 40 minutes and they were well on their way to being VERY dried out). Remove from oven and sprinkle with chopped tarragon. Slice each breast into 4 pieces and serve with 2 tablespoons of sauce.

The Verdict: We both liked these. I was actually suprised how well they turned out. The stock I used was a tad on the salty side, but that's fixable. Also the cooking time needed to be tweaked a little but in all it's a pretty good recipe!

Thanks to Sarah at I Blame Thank My Mother for hosting The Food Network Chef's Challenge every week!

***

P.S. If you missed my new blog design reveal post, go back and check it out! I'm giving away a customized sock monkey to one lucky person.