Italian Chicken Crescent Braid

Italian Chicken Crescent Braid

I thought I would do a little post about what I'm making for dinner tonight, and I'll actually be able to post the recipe since I made this one up. I'm calling it an italian chicken braid, which sounds fancy, looks fancy, but is really very easy to make. It's so good to, I think I'm a bit addicted to it, of course it's wrapped in crescent rolls so it has to be pretty good. 

Ingredients:

1lb ground chicken

1 tube refrigerated crescent rolls 

1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese

Sea salt
Black pepper
~1 tsp Garlic powder
Dried oregano
Dried basil 
~1 tsp Chicken bullion granules
Dried parsley flakes
~1Tbs olive oil
Non stick cooking spray
4-5 Ritz butter crackers (optional)

The ingredients aren't quite exact I know, but I've never really measured it out and the flavoring is all kind of to taste. So put a little more or a little less of the ingredients that you like.

To start you want to brown the ground chicken in a pot with a little bit of olive oil over medium heat. Make sure that it all gets broken up into small pieces. Once it's browned turn it down to a low heat and you can start adding the flavors. Add in a couple grinds of sea salt and a few grinds of pepper. I always add more pepper, I'm a little obsessed with pepper. Add about a teaspoon of garlic powder or garlic salt, you may want to use more or less than this depending on your garlic preferences. Add a small shake of oregano, it's powerful a little bit will go a long way, you really don't want to add too much. Add a few shakes of basil, this can be a little strong to, just use your best judgment. Add about a teaspoon of chicken bullion granules, this adds some extra flavor to the chicken, I love adding these granules to lots of things when I'm cooking to get a bit more depth of flavor, but be careful it can add a lot of extra salt. And finally add in some parsley, it gives it a little bit of flavor and some color, you can't really add too much. If you would like to add a bit of extra flavor and a bit of crunch, crush up a few Ritz crackers and mix them into the chicken as well. Make sure all of this is stirred all together well and take a little taste to make sure that you have all of the flavors right. Sometimes chicken needs a lot of extra flavor to help it along. Once it's to your liking set it aside and let it mostly cool.

While it's cooling set your oven to the temperature advised by the crescent roll instructions. I use Pillsbury reduced fat crescents, but use whatever ones you like. Take out a sheet pan and spray it with cooking oil. Now comes the somewhat hard part of setting up the crescent braid. Open the tube and take out the rolls. In pairs, line them up with the small edges together and place them on the pan in a line. You want to squish the rolls together to make sure you get a nice hold and flatten them out a bit to expand the surface area. You will be laying the chicken along the center line so you don't want the chicken falling out. It will look something like this.

Once the chicken is pretty much cooled, you don't want to add it too early and have the heat start cooking the rolls, spoon it onto the rolls. Arrange it in a sort of loaf form along the center line of the rolls, make sure its in an even thickness so the portions will all be the even. 

Next add the cheese on top of the chicken. I said to use a cup but use as much or as little as you'd like, although you don't want too too much or it won't fit and you'll have a lot of oozing cheese. I suggest to use mozzarella but use whatever cheese that you like. I tend to always forget to add the cheese and then I remember and have to un-braid everything, make sure you remember the cheese in the first place, it's so much easier.

Now it's time to braid the rolls over the chicken. Take the top two outside corners and lift and cross them over the chicken and cheese mixture. Continue this with each pair of roll corners. It will look kind of like this, please excuse my rough diagrams, hopefully it'll get you a good enough idea.

Now make sure all the chicken is tucked in and arranged well. Then place it in the oven for the time it says to bake the crescent rolls. You may need just a few more minutes than the tube says, just cook it until the rolls are golden and the cheese is melted. Then take it out and cut it into four servings, or you can make smaller servings if you like.

And there you have it, one fancy looking, easy to do, yummy meal. You can also do this same technique with taco meat instead of seasoned chicken for a different kind of taco.

Now go try it, I hope you like it.