Monday, March 2, 2009

Three Cheese Penne and Chicken Florentine

Brooke posted this Three Cheese Penne and Chicken Florentine dinner awhile ago, and I starred it right away. I, too, get "Dinner Tonight" from myrecipes.com, but I don't know how this one escaped being saved by me!


I followed many of Brooke's adaptations and made some of my own. This is perhaps one of my favorite things about cooking; you make minor changes, and then someone else makes minor changes, and then someone else... and you have all of these cool variations on the same dish. I really enjoy making a dish "mine"!

Anyway, this dinner was so amazingly delicious. It was very comfort-food-ish, but I didn't feel super guilty about it. I will absolutely be making this again.


Ingredients
  • Cooking spray
  • 3 cups thinly sliced mushrooms - omitted only because I forgot to buy them
  • 1 cup chopped onion
  • 2 tsp minced garlic
  • 3 cups chopped fresh spinach
  • 1 tablespoon chopped fresh basil
  • 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
  • 1 (15-ounce) carton skim ricotta
  • 4 cups hot cooked penne (about 8 ounces uncooked tube-shaped pasta)
  • 2 cups shredded roasted skinless, boneless chicken breast
  • 1 cup (4 ounces) shredded reduced-fat sharp mozzarella cheese, divided
  • 1/2 cup (2 ounces) grated fresh Parmesan cheese, divided
  • 1/4 cup skim milk
  • 1/4 cup fat free half and half
  • 1 (10 3/4-ounce) can condensed reduced-fat, reduced-sodium cream of mushroom soup, undiluted

Preheat oven to 425°.

In a large nonstick skillet coated with cooking spray over medium-high heat, add mushrooms, garlic, and onion; sauté 4 minutes or until tender. Add spinach, basil, and black pepper; sauté 3 minutes or just until spinach wilts.

Combine spinach mixture, ricotta cheese, pasta, chicken, 3/4 cup mozzarella cheese, 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese, milk, and soup in a large bowl. Spoon mixture into a 2-quart baking dish coated with cooking spray. Sprinkle with remaining 1/4 cup cheddar cheese and remaining 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese. Bake at 425° for 25 minutes or until lightly browned and bubbly.

3 comments:

  1. I made an adaptation of this recipe last night too! I ended up omitting the chicken because we served it as a side dish, but it was so good and a great way to sneak in some veggies! Yours looks delicious though- I will have to try this version as well.

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  2. Wow, that looks great! YAY to Lauren for pointing out great things that I miss (I get both Brooke's blog AND Dinner tonight and didn't see this!)

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  3. This sounds amazing! I'll have to add it to my menu sometime soon.

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