These juicy chicken breasts are stuffed with garlicky mushrooms, spinach and a blanket of oozing melted cheese. Simple to make with just a few ingredients, this is how to transform chicken breast from ho-hum into “ohhh yum!”
After this one, try Sun Dried Tomato Stuffed Chicken!
Stuffed chicken breast
Mushroom-Stuffed Chicken Breast is one of those recipes where you take just a few ingredients and deploy them in a way that makes chicken breast so much more interesting than it usually is! Chicken breast, spinach, mushrooms, garlic and cheese are the only base ingredients here. Vary the type of cheese and swap the spinach for other leafy veg to spin this dish to suit your tastes or what you have on hand!
To make it, it’s as simple as frying off the mushrooms and spinach, stuffing the chicken, giving it a quick sear and then baking to finish it off. The reward is THIS for dinner tonight ↓↓↓!
Looks a whole lot more interesting than the usual dull chicken breast recipes, right??!!
Ingredients in Mushroom-Stuffed Chicken Breast
Here’s what you need to make this recipe. Not that much, like I said!!
All these ingredients are pretty straightforward, so I don’t think I need to run through them like I usually do. Just a few points:
Chicken – It needs to be breast to be large enough to cut deep pockets. Boneless thigh won’t work;
Baby spinach – Chopped or sliced ordinary spinach, silverbeet (Swiss chard), kale or cabbage will work fine too;
Cheese – Anything that melts will work great. Mozzarella is ideal because it melts well but isn’t as runny as, say, cheddar or tasty cheese. This is worth bearing in mind since we don’t fully seal the chicken like with Chicken Kiev since it’s a quick recipe, so some cheese is likely to escape!;
Thyme – Fresh thyme and mushroom are such a classic combination, I can’t help but use it often! Dried thyme can be used as an alternative, else dried oregano, marjoram or rosemary. Fresh versions of any of the aforementioned will also be perfect, as would parsley or tarragon. Most herbs, really!
How to make it
One tip: stuff generously. Like paltry pie fillings and dinky dumplings, nothing is sadder in this life than stingy stuffing!
Sauté mushroom and spinach – The key here is to get great colour on the mushrooms. Colour means flavour, and we never say no to flavour.
Cut pocket slits – Cut a pocket in the chicken breast, per the diagram below, being sure not to cut all the way through. Cut the side where the meat has a fold, not the smooth side.
Season the chicken, including inside the pocket, with salt and pepper;
Stuff generously with the mushroom and spinach, then stuff in cheese slices;
Seal with 2 or 3 toothpicks. It will be stuffed too much to seal completely, and that’s OK (in fact it’s good!) The goal here is just to keep it closed enough so the filling stays mostly in place. Just insert the toothpicks on the diagonal, that’s enough to hold it in place.
Sealed and ready! This photo shows what it looks like once sealed. Ready to cook!
Brown the breast in an oven-proof skillet (so we can take it straight from the stove to the oven);
Bake and rest – Bake for 15 minutes or until the internal temperature of the chicken is 65°C / 149°F. Then remove the chicken to a plate and rest for 5 minutes before serving. Resting is an essential step after cooking any protein to allow the juices in the meat to redistribute. If you don’t rest, the meat juices run out onto the plate when you cut into it.
What to serve with Mushroom-Stuffed Chicken Breast
The nice thing about this chicken breast recipe is that there’s already a decent amount of vegetables in it, making it virtually a meal-in-one. While our mums would beam approvingly if they knew we’d made the effort make an extra vegetable side dish, the truth is I wouldn’t go too far out of my way for it! For the photo above all I did was take the leftover baby spinach and drizzled it with some Balsamic Dressing. Totally simple and lazy, but hey it does the trick!
If you feel like making your mum proud though, have a browse of Vegetable and Side Salads. It’s organised by vegetable to make it easy to use something you’ve got!
Also pictured on the side is Lemon Herb Risotto. Before you start furrowing your brow at the thought of the effort needed to make a risotto, know that this is a simple no-stir, baked risotto! You read that right. Not only that, the results are staggeringly close to – no, I’d even say virtually indistinguishable from – traditional risotto. Creamy, luscious and perfectly al dente, all without standing at the stove stirring for thirty minutes.
Try it. I think you’ll be surprised! – Nagi x
Watch how to make it
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Mushroom Stuffed Chicken Breast
Ingredients
- 2 x 220g / 7oz chicken breast , skinless boneless (Note 1)
- 3/4 tsp salt
- 1/4 tsp pepper
- 30g / 2 tbsp unsalted butter
- 200g / 7 oz mushrooms , sliced 3mm (1/8″) thick (~2 heaped cups)
- 2 garlic cloves , finely minced
- 1/2 tsp thyme leaves (Note 2)
- 2 cups baby spinach (Note 3)
- 80 g / 3oz mozzarella , sliced (or other melting cheese)
- 1 tbsp olive oil
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 200°C/390°F (180°F fan).
- Cut pockets into each chicken breast, being sure not to cut all the way through (see photos in post). Cut on the side with the fold in the meat, to keep the smooth side intact.
- Season the inside and outside of the chicken with half the salt and pepper.
- Mushroom filling: Melt butter in a heavy based oven proof skillet over high heat. Add mushrooms and cook for 3 minutes until they start to turn pretty golden. Then add garlic, thyme, remaining salt and pepper and continue cooking for a further 2 minutes until mushrooms are nice and golden.
- Add spinach: Add baby spinach and stir until wilted – about 30 seconds.
- Stuff mushroom mixture into the pocket of each chicken, then top with cheese.
- Seal with toothpicks as best you can – it doesn’t need to be fully sealed like we do with Chicken Kiev. Just mostly sealed.
- Sear chicken: Give the pan a quick wipe with paper towels. Heat oil over medium high heat. Sear each side of the chicken breast for 1 1/2 minutes until golden.
- Bake 15 minutes: Transfer the skillet to the oven and bake for 15 minutes, or until the internal temperature of the chicken is 65°C/149°F (chicken flesh, not the mushroom filling).
- Rest 5 minutes: Remove from tray onto a plate, loosely cover with foil and rest for 5 minutes. Serve! Pictured in post with easy creamy Baked Lemon Herb Risotto and baby spinach with Balsamic Dressing.
Recipe Notes:
Nutrition Information:
Life of Dozer
Life of Dozer… and Life of Nagi!!
just made this tonight oh my goodness so tasty!!! Didn’t put spinach in as didn’t have and also not a mad lover of it either, so so good will be making it again very soon had with mashed potato and sauté asparagus
Wow, the stuffed chicken breast certainly took chicken to a new level! Lovely mix of flavours and the melted cheese was a good addition – I only had grated mozzarella and it worked fine. Very filling, we could have probably shared one but it was so tasty I ate the whole thing. Thanks for another winning recipe!
I worked as a professional chef and below is the way we used to hold the filling in a stuffed chicken breast utilising the mini chicken fillet attached to the chicken breast.
1st batter out to a thin escallop the mini chicken fillet, then slice the chicken open as per instructions on the recipe guide. Fill the chicken as per recipe guide and then take the chicken fillet and wrap around the filling tucking the edges of the mini fillet between the filling and the inside of the cut chicken fillet. This will seal and hold all the filling inside.
I’m making this right now for dinner, but shouldn’t the internal temperature of the chicken be 165 degrees? Thank you for sharing your recipe!
You are correct. The temperature here must be a typo because in her oven baked chicken breast recipe, Nagi has the internal temp as 165°F/75°C, which is the minimum required to make it safe.
My family loved this. I did enhance it a little by adding a spoonful of Gorgonzola cheese to each chicken breast and then wrapped each one with a piece of slightly cooked bacon.
I forgot to sear the chicken breasts before putting in a glass baking tray, so I wrapped each filled chicken breast with bacon strip and doubled the time in the oven. Came out delish
Delicious. I added browned pine nuts as well.
Live Caloundra single guy (72) your tips, food , fantastic 😍
Forgot the stars – 5+
Oh Nagi, this was supercalifragilistic expialidocious! The male occupant of the house scored it an 11/10! I had ambitions to make your lemon risotto but didn’t have time for the extra prep this time (great to see that recipe can be prepared and reheated for next time). I served it with Guzzi’s Pappardelle (Woolies and imho the best), lightly buttered with fresh dill, black pepper and grated parmesan. And just one slice of fresh tomato on the side to lift. I also took up another reviewer’s comment to pour in some white wine halfway through baking the chicken. Thank you so much as always.
Very simple to make and VERY TASTY. Thanks for another great recipe! You are my go to!
This dish was fantastic!!! Just like every other dish I make from your recipe tin!😄 You are the bomb!!❤️👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻
This was amazing! Added a shallot with the mushrooms. Used Gruyère cheese instead of mozzarella. I pounded the chicken breast flat and rolled it with the filling inside and used toothpicks to seal. Browned extra butter to coat chicken breast while cooking. Yum! Will make again!
This recipe is easy to make and very delicious. Even my fussy hubby loved it.
This was absolutely delish!!
V tasty! I used cabbage as had no spinach and used Swiss cheese. Def make again.
This was delicious, chicken was juicy and cooked perfectly. Loved it . Thanks Nagi
It was amazing!!! Used spicy dill and smoked Gouda for cheese. Easy recipe
hi this was just amazing. thank god i found your page.
hi this was just amazing. thank god i found this page.