No more teasing. It’s time to talk about this recipe. This recipe was awesome. It has won its spot in a sheet protector safely ensconsed in my binder of recipes. I feel like I have my own little cookbook going. 
One that I can go to and pull something out of that I am sure will please me! YAY!
This recipe is for Monterey Chicken Rolls. You can go to Recipezaar to see the original recipe. Here’s what I did, with help from the comments on that recipe.
My version included the following ingredients: boneless skinless chicken breasts, 3-4 cloves of garlic, butter, breadcrumbs, and cheese.
First, get yourself about a 1/2 a stick of butter. If you have more than just 2 chicken breast halves you might need a bit more. Place the stick of butter in a microwave safe bowl and melt in microwave. I normally put it in there for 10-15 second intervals. While you are melting the butter, mince your garlic. I’ve been using LOTS of fresh garlic lately, and loving it. I’m finding garlic is a seasoning I love. However with the amount I’ve been using lately, I think I’m going to have to consider a garlic press. It would make life easier.
Place your minced garlic into your melted butter and set off to the side while you complete the next step. Things will get a little fragrant in your kitchen as the heated butter might make the garlic smell a bit. Ahhhh, heaven.
It’s time to find your breadcrumbs and cheese. Please some of the breadcrums in a bowl, plate, or other container that’s going to be big enough for the chicken breasts you have.
If you’re using block cheese like I am, go ahead and shred it up. I used the fine shred option with my little hand-held shredder.
Place your chicken breast halves in a ziploc bag or between sheets of saran wrap. Beat them with a tenderizer, heavy pot, or the like to flatten them out a bit. I should have flattened mine a bit more, but they worked out well nonetheless.
It’s time to “batter” this chicken. Place the chicken in the butter/garlic combination. Make sure to coat both sides.
Next, place the chicken on the breadcrumb plate. Coat both sides.
Place the shredded cheese along the top of your chicken concoction. Roll the whole thing up.
Place the chicken rolls on a baking sheet. If you have some leftover shredded cheese, feel free to sprinkle it on the top of each roll. It will make a nice little crust with the breadcrumbs. Bake at 350 degrees for approximately 30 minutes.
Once baked, take out and let sit for 2-3 minutes. I’ve cut one in half so you can see all the cheesy goodness inside. I used four cloves of garlic in my butter mixture and the garlic taste in this was quite noticeable. Not too strong for me, but definitely noticeable. I loved it!
Here it is in the bento I brought to work today.
I paired the chicken with more steamed green beans and carrots, one of my favorite combos.
I also boiled a few eggs this morning for deviled eggs. I’m only showing 2 sections of my Lock & Lock second tier because I couldn’t figure out anything to put in the last section. I left it empty. Must think on that more for tomorrow’s bento.
It was a great meal that I highly enjoyed. If you try it, I hope you enjoy it too! Be the bento everyone!
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YUM! This kind of looks like a recipe I used to make, but I didn’t roll it up. Used the same sort of ingredients (except panko, cause I hadn’t discovered that yet; used normal breadcrumbs instead).
I really need to get a meat pounder. So many recipes call for pounded meat and I never seem to get it flat enough with the implements of doom I use.
Did you wind up putting PB pretzels in that last section?
(I always tweak recipes so I have to)
BTW, I totally do that too – the sheet protectors, binder, “My own cookbook” deal. I write on the print outs my notes, too
Please oh please don’t get a garlic press though. Freshly minced garlic with knife work only takes a fraction of a second and I feel like when you use a press, you lose a lot of what makes the garlic so good! (Ok, I’ll be honest here: I don’t really know why using a garlic press skeeves me, but it does, and that might be in part due to hearing TV chefs say that garlic presses are no good. Sorry if that makes me a follower!)
<3
LOL! Good comments though. I don’t know anything about a garlic press, and don’t often see it used on the few cooking shows that I do catch here and there.
Actually, the pet peeve of my own isn’t so much the chopping of the garlic, though it is a little frustrating because my knife skills are nill. I’m also frustrated that garlic sticks to everything when cut: my knife, my fingers, a utensil. If it gets on my hands, I feel like it sucks up the oil from my hand or something and almost dries out the area it sticks too. I feel like I have to wash my hands to get them to feel “normal” again. I’m a nutcase, I know. LOL!
And no, no pb pretzels in the last section. It ended up staying empty. I have no more pretzels. I had purchased a very, very small amount of them. However, I do need to go to Harry & David to buy some cherry preserves. I like to eat toast with that on it in the winter. I’m thinking of picking up some pretzels and the like there when I stop in. Oh bad me!
Looks so yummy. I personally like grating garlic through a microplane. Each clove takes just seconds and there’s almost no waste. But there is something fun about squeezing it through a good crusher.
One of the reasons I think so many chefs dislike garlic presses is that so many of them are poorly designed, don’t perform the task well, break or are impossible to clean. This article breaks it down nicely: http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9901E3DA133AF933A25752C0A9679C8B63&scp=1&sq=
As for the sticking, if you rub your fingers on something stainless steel (not chrome), the sticky feeling should go away. I’d wash my hands anyway just to alleviate the garlic smell though.
I got this garlic slicer at Williams Sonoma to use up the balance of a gift card. It looks kind of like this:
http://cn1.kaboodle.com/hi/img/2/0/0/75/8/AAAAApbigToAAAAAAHWKsw.jpg
It doesn’t completely mince the garlic, but I find that 2 or 3 swipes with the chef knife get it right.
I was looking at a garlic press at Williams Sonoma the other day and thought of you/this post. I decided why it bothers me. Garlic juice! When you put it through a press, unless you’re pressing it right into the pot or bowl, you lose all the juice and that bothers me.
I know the feeling though, I always thought it’s because I tend to use “old” garlic (I buy a lot of garlic but go through spurts of using it versus not using it often, so some of it tends to sit for a long while before I use it) and that’s why it was kind of dryish, but I realized now that it always is like that. I just always make sure I chop and drop into the pan right away, and that I wash my hands (and knife) right after I am done with the garlic, even if I’m about to do something else that requires more chopping.
Don’t get a garlic mincer. It destroys garlic and wastes so much of the actual clove.
This recipe looks deadly..lol. I’m trying it this week. lol.
ty for sharing.
Mrs. F.
Ive been reading on your blog for probably a good hour. Im just discovering “Bento” today! Anyway, that recipe looks YUMMY! im going to copy it down and try it out!