I saw this recipe and immediately liked all the ingredients and thought they would be delicious combined...but with a whopping 1000+ calories and 78 grams of fat, I wanted to find a way of reducing both of these. I was successful, so here is what I did.
I used 3 Tbsp of olive oil in the cheese sauce mixture (instead of 1 cup). I diced my raw chicken and cooked it in a non-stick skillet with about 2 tsp of olive oil. I used dried sun-dried tomatoes (instead of those packed in olive oil which contain CONSIDERABLE more fat and calories). If you use dried, be sure to blanch them in boiling water for 2-3 minutes first to soften them up. I used 'light' ricotta and feta cheeses. Lastly, I increased the cloves of garlic to 4 large and I omitted the dried basil (the pesto has more than enough). For the method, I cooked the chicken and removed from the pan. In the juices/oil left in the pan, I sauteed the garlic until fragrant and then added the sundried tomatoes; cooked until heated through and added the chicken back to the pan along with the cheese sauce. I heated this through and ended up adding a big ladle of the pasta cooking water to thin the sauce out (the sauce was a little on the thick side given the reduction of olive oil). Once the pasta was done, I put it in the pan (don't rinse it!) along with the chicken and sauce. The end result was really good and significantly more healthy. The only change I would make if I were to make
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