Sun Dried Tomato Tapenade Stuffed Chicken Breasts

The sunny weather has got me in full-on Mediterranean mode at the moment!  This is another one of those simple assembly jobs that always seems to impress people.  It’s a twist on the pesto chicken recipe below, and like that I always prefer to make it with home-made tapenade (my favourite recipe is Delia’s sun dried tomato tapenade, link below) but you could, of course, use ready-made. 

http://www.deliaonline.com/recipes/main-ingredient/vegetables/tomato/tapenade-of-sun-dried-tomatoes-olives-and-basil.html

For two people I used: 

2 chicken breasts

4 slices parma ham

2dsp tapenade

2 or 3 basil leaves

Salt and pepper to taste 

Simply butterfly the chicken breasts, season and spread each with a dessertspoon of tapenade.  Add 1 or 2 torn basil leaves and fold over the top flap of the breasts.  Wrap in the parma ham and place in a baking dish.  Drizzle them with a little olive oil and give another seasoning of ground black pepper 

Bake in a hot oven (190^oC / 375^oF / Gas Mark 5) for 30 minutes or so, until the chicken is cooked through. 

You can serve this with pasta, buttery boiled new potatoes or over rice.  A crisp salad alongside is always nice too.  Ditto some crusty bread and a bowl of olive oil and balsamic vinegar for dipping! 

The tapenade recipe makes far more than you need for this recipe, but it’s so tasty that it’s worth making the whole amount of tapenade and using it to top slices of crusty bread or as a pasta sauce.