Wednesday, July 08, 2009

The Ground Chicken Junkie



Herbed Chicken Meatloaf
from myrecipes.com

1/2 cup frozen diced onion, red and green bell pepper, and celery I used fresh, about 1 cup
1 teaspoon olive oil
2 pounds ground chicken
1/2 cup fine, dry breadcrumbs
1/3 cup light mayonnaise
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
2 tablespoons chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
2 teaspoons Greek seasoning I used McCormick's
1/2 teaspoon lemon zest
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
Pita rounds, split I used whole wheat pitas
Toppings: sliced cucumber, sliced tomatoes, crumbled feta cheese, plain yogurt, kalamata olives, lettuce leaves

1. Preheat oven to 350°. Sauté onion, red and green bell pepper, and celery in hot oil in a small skillet over medium-high heat 5 to 7 minutes or until vegetables are tender.
2. Stir together ground chicken, next 8 ingredients, and sautéed vegetables in a large bowl just until combined.
3. Place mixture in a lightly greased 9- x 5-inch baking dish. Bake at 350° for 1 hour to 1 hour and 10 minutes or until a meat thermometer registers 165°. Let stand 10 minutes before slicing. Serve meatloaf slices in pita rounds with desired toppings.

Makes 8 servings
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Maybe I will just change this blog to a ground chicken blog. I just love the stuff. I'm sure I'll get a dud recipe eventually but so far I haven't had one with ground chicken. It's pretty hard to make a bad meat loaf too.

As usual, I made the meat loaf ahead of time and then I sliced and grilled it on the Griddler. I love that extra step but it's definitely not necessary. The lemon and Greek seasoning gave this meat loaf a different flavor than your typical meat loaf which made me happy. I love all kinds of meat loaf but it's nice to veer off the path of traditional meat loaf for a change.

An even bigger plus was that this is made into pita sandwiches. You know how my husband likes sandwiches. I topped it with homemade tzatziki sauce (although I managed to drop most of the batch on the floor GRRRRRRRRR I paid $1.69 for 8 oz of Greek yogurt!), sliced some sweet onions, kalamata olives, feta and tomato. Yummy.

The boy asked for chicken tenders and since I had a baby screaming and other chaos happening while I was trying to make dinner, I readily agreed. I'm not sure if he would have liked this or not. He usually likes meat loaf. My husband scarfed this down.

This is definitely a keeper, just like all of my other ground chicken recipes.

Question of the Day: Is there any particular ingredient you are loving right now?

3 comments:

Noel said...

I know this doesnt sound fun or anything but I am on a pepper kick, the more the better. On just about everything too. :)

Anonymous said...

Just wanted to let you know I did a basic version of your herbed chicken loaf-mine tasted an awful lot like Gyro meat (which had me stoked-my husband is allergic to all red meat and I haven't had a Gyro in ages.)

I made some homemade pitas and tzatziki (sp.?) sauce to go with. Yum.

Anonymous said...

Cumin, I'm in love with cumin right now!!