Stuffed Chicken Parmesan. Chicken breasts breaded with a delicious coating and stuffed with chicken sausage and mozzarella cheese. Served over linguine with a homemade tomato sauce.
Meatballs
My one year old loves Italian. I mentioned in the Instant Pot Meatballs post that she once ate so many meatballs, my husband started calling her meatball for a few days. And whenever there is pasta around, that girl crushes it.
We were in South Carolina visiting my family for Thanksgiving and my daughter got sick. She wasn’t eating much of anything for a couple of days. I decided to order some take out pasta to see if she would eat that. It cured her woes. She ate as much as her tiny belly could hold, and started feeling better.
Pasta for the Win
When we returned home from the trip, I wanted to make sure that my daughter would continue to eat and feel better, so I knew I needed to come up with a dinner that included pasta. I decided chicken parmesan would be the answer. However, I wanted to do something a little different. Stuffing it with Italian chicken sausage seemed like it could work. And it did. My daughter LOVED it.
In fact, the following night, she went to the refrigerator, pointed at the cold pasta, and started yelling. I was a little confused what she wanted but gave her a couple of cold noodles. She gobbled them up and began doing her sign language for ‘more’. Girl ate a whole bowl of cold pasta for her appetizer.
Stuffed Chicken Parmesan
For this sausage stuffed chicken parmesan, I wanted the coating to have good flavor, so I used a combination of Panko and Italian breadcrumbs, with some spices as well. For the filling, I sauteed Italian chicken sausage, mixed it with mozzarella cheese, and stuffed it into the chicken breasts.
I always enjoy homemade tomato pasta sauce, so that’s what I used for this recipe. It doesn’t take long to put together the sauce, but if you’re running short on time, you could always use a pre-made jar of your favorite sauce.
This sausage stuffed chicken parmesan is filling, delicious, and perfect for a family winter dinner!
Stuffed Chicken Parmesan
Ingredients
Chicken and Stuffing
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 1.5 pounds chicken breasts sliced to ~3/4" each, will be about 6 thin breasts
- 3 tbsp butter divided
- 6 ounces sweet Italian chicken sausage 2 links
- 1/2 cup shredded Mozzarella cheese
Coating
- 1/2 cup panko breadcrumbs
- 1/2 cup Italian breadcrumbs
- 2 tbsp fresh grated Parmesan cheese
- 1/4 teaspoon ground thyme
- 1/2 tbsp Italian seasoning
- 1/4 teaspoon onion powder
- 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 2 large eggs
- 1 tbsp lemon juice
Tomato Sauce
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 2 teaspoons fresh garlic
- 28 ounces crushed tomatoes
- 15 ounces tomato sauce
- 12 ounces tomato paste
- 1 tbsp Italian seasoning
- 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
- 1/2 tbsp dried basil
- 1/2 teaspoon onion powder
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 tbsp sugar
- 1/4 teaspoon ground thyme
- 1/2 tbsp marjoram
Serving
- 1/2 cup shredded Mozzarella cheese
- 3/4 pound dry linguine noodles
Instructions
Tomato Sauce
- Heat olive oil in a large sauce pan over medium-high heat. Add garlic and saute for 1 minute.
- Add crushed tomatoes, tomato sauce, tomato paste, Italian seasoning, pepper, basil, onion, salt, sugar, thyme, and marjoram. Stir well.
- Reduce to low and let gently simmer, covered, for 30 minutes.
Chicken
- Cut chicken breasts so that they are about 3/4" thick. You can also use a mallet to pound the breasts to this thickness. In the thickest part of the chicken breast, use a pairing knife to cut a 1" opening. Use the knife to cut a pocket inside the breast. Set chicken aside.
- Remove sausage from casings and crumble as best you can. Heat 1 tbsp olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add chicken to skillet and saute until lightly browned, about 3 minutes.
- In a small bowl, stir together browned chicken sausage with 1/2 cup Mozzarella cheese. Stuff each chicken breast with the sausage/cheese mixture.
- Whisk together eggs and lemon juice in a shallow bowl. In a second shallow bowl, stir together panko, Italian breadcrumbs, thyme, Italian seasoning, onion powder, pepper, salt, and Parmesan cheese.
- Dredge each stuffed chicken breast through the egg mixture on both sides. Then, dredge through the breadcrumb mixture on both sides. Set aside.
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Set an oven safe rack (I use a cookie cooling rack) on a large baking sheet.
- Melt 1.5 tbsp butter in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add 3 of the coated breasts to skillet and brown for 3 minutes. Flip breasts and brown on other side for 3 minutes. Remove from skillet. Melt remaining 1.5 tbsp of butter in skillet and repeat with remaining 3 breasts.
- Place breasts on prepared baking sheet. Bake for 20 minutes. After this time, divide remaining 1/2 cup Mozzarella cheese over the breasts and bake for another 5 minutes. Make sure your breasts are cooked through by cutting into the thickest part of the breast. Depending on how thick you cut your breasts, they may need a few minutes longer to cook.
Serving
- While chicken is baking, prepare linguine according to package directions.
- Serve chicken over linguine with tomato sauce.
Notes
Nutrition
If you enjoyed this Stuffed Chicken Parmesan, you’ll probably enjoy these other SugarSpicesLife recipes:
Italian Almond Cookies
Emily’s Baked Ziti
Instant Pot Garlic Rosemary Bread
Cheesy Chicken Lasagna