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$5 Dinners | Budget Recipes, Meal Plans, Freezer Meals

Budget Recipes, Meal Plans, Freezer Meals and Cooking Tutorials for the Busy Home Chef

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Baked Cheddar Chicken with Sauce

November 3, 2011 by Erin, The $5 Dinner Mom 20 Comments

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cheesey-baked-chicken2

College students, want to impress your parents? Husbands, your wives? Anyone want to impress company?? Then THIS is for you.

Oh, yeah, I guess you can feed it to the kiddos too!

I am eating the baked cheddar chicken right now as leftovers. And I do not eat leftovers.  Luckily for me, unfortunately, my husband left his lunch at home today so it’s all mine. 🙂

This is very easy to prepare, but get ready for all the compliments afterwords.  I would say it’s definitely a “need to make dinner for company recipe!” It even looks like you spent a lot of time on it!

Cheesey baked Chicken1

After the chicken is in the pan, I just dumped the left over cheese & cracker crumbs on top of it. I love crust.

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Baked Cheddar Chicken

Yield – 7 servings

Preparation Time – 15 minutes

Cooking Time – 40 minutes

Ingredients

  • 5 large boneless, skinless chicken breasts
  • 1 sleeve Ritz crackers
  • Salt and pepper, to taste
  • 1/2 cup milk
  • 3 cups shredded cheddar cheese
  • 1 tsp dried parsley
  • 14 oz. can cream of chicken soup
  • 2 Tbsp butter
  • 2 Tbsp sour cream
  • Fresh veggies, as side dish
  • Favorite side dish like rice, pasta, or mashed potatoes.
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Directions

  • Preheat oven to 400 F.
  • Cut each chicken breast into 3 large chunks.
  • In a gallon size baggie, smash ritz crackers into crumbs. (The kids love this part)
  • Pour the milk, cheese and cracker crumbs into 3 separate small pans. Toss the salt and pepper into the cracker crumbs and stir the mixture around to combine.
  • Prepare a 9×13 baking dish by spraying it with non-stick cooking spray.
  • Dip each piece of chicken into the milk, cheese & crumbs in succession, and lay in the prepared pan.
  • Sprinkle the dried parsley over the chicken in the pan.
  • Cover the pan with foil and bake for 40 minutes, until the chicken is thoroughly cooked.
  • Combine the cream of chicken soup, sour cream, and butter in a small sauce pan on the stove and heat until mixed together and warm.  Spread the sauce over the chicken prior to serving.
  • Prepare fresh veggies.
  • Serve Baked Cheddar Chicken with fresh veggies.
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Filed Under: Budget Friendly Recipes, Chicken Recipes

Comments

  1. Claire says

    November 3, 2011 at 5:47 pm

    I am really looking forward to making this. My family of 8 eats lots of cheese and love chicken. thank you for creating such a simple yet yummy dish!

    Reply
  2. Kelly Hess says

    November 4, 2011 at 4:34 am

    Yum! Just bookmarked this one!

    Reply
  3. Andy says

    November 4, 2011 at 2:53 pm

    This looks so good.

    Reply
  4. Amanda says

    November 9, 2011 at 7:55 am

    Winner Winner Chicken Dinner!!!!! This was AMAZING!!! We all loved it. I did however, not cover it the entire baking time. I did 20 min. covered and 20 uncovered. Thanks, this will be on the dinner rotation!!!

    Reply
  5. Darcy says

    November 13, 2011 at 5:39 pm

    YUM! Excellent with mashed potatoes! and we love garlic, so added garlic/onion powders and a little paprika to the crumb mix – Tasty! Thanks.

    Reply
  6. Nicole @ Some Call It Natural says

    November 15, 2011 at 6:38 pm

    Mine are in the oven! It’s too late for this meal, but how do you get the cheese and crackers to stick to the chicken?? I dipped it in the milk, then cheese, then crackers as the directions stated, but I ended up having to place more cheese and crackers on each piece after it was in the dish. And I definitely did not use all the cracker and cheese because of that… :/

    Reply
  7. Angie Atchley says

    November 16, 2011 at 10:05 am

    Nicole, I used the finely shredded cheese. I can see how it would be harder to stick if you used the thicker cheese. Then just dump the unused cheese & crackers on top!

    How did it turn out?

    Reply
    • Nicole @ Some Call It Natural says

      May 5, 2012 at 1:48 am

      Angie,
      Thanks. I will try the finely shredded cheese next time.

      It turned out great, but not quite right… I’m ready to try it again! 🙂

      P.S… Sorry this took me so long to reply… I didn’t see your comment until just now.

      Reply
  8. Randie says

    February 29, 2012 at 11:50 pm

    What the heck! I thought this was “5 Dollar Dinners”??? The amount above says $9.55. Almost twice as much…how misleading and a waist of my time.

    Reply
    • Jazz says

      August 30, 2012 at 5:57 pm

      *waste

      Reply
  9. Angie says

    March 1, 2012 at 12:17 am

    Randie, so sorry to confuse you. There are several of us who post on Thursdays who have large families and we do recipes for 10.00 and under. If you look at the number of servings, it’s always larger than the average family. Just go ahead and half the recipe and you will have the dinner for under 5.00.

    Reply
  10. Carol Sawyer says

    March 19, 2012 at 6:14 pm

    What a great idea…cannot wait to see more!

    Reply
  11. kim says

    June 28, 2013 at 4:46 pm

    A couple of thoughts because I do make this often.

    1. I like to use buttermilk; or, a mix of 1 small egg and milk. Milk I find, especially reduced fat, just doesn’t work for me. It does work … just not as well.

    2. Make sure to use finely grated cheese. It makes a huge difference. Also I do find ground the breading/crackers to make a fine coating. Very important.

    3. Make sure to let most of the coating drain off. TOO much will cause the coating to slip off.

    4. Let the chicken rest on the pan, at least 10 minutes before baking.

    5. Also, make sure that the chicken, and milk mixture are room temp. NOT cold

    Reply
  12. Beth says

    April 7, 2014 at 12:38 pm

    This is the Best Chicken we have had in awhile, Great Flavor & ready to make it again thanks for sharing the recipe

    Reply
  13. ellen says

    April 14, 2014 at 9:19 am

    I was wanting to do this for a crowd of women. Would this freeze or do you have any suggestions? I have tried the recipe and it was great!

    Reply
  14. Alissa says

    September 23, 2014 at 5:57 pm

    Looking forward to trying this, got it in the oven 😃

    Reply
  15. Erin H says

    May 1, 2015 at 6:11 pm

    This looks delicious! I think we might try this for dinner!

    Reply
  16. eleftheria says

    May 2, 2015 at 11:47 am

    This is a delicious, economical, and easy recipe to feed a family of hungry growing boys. Thank you!

    Reply
  17. Terry says

    May 4, 2015 at 8:57 am

    If you’re having trouble getting the coating to stick, try dipping the chicken in mayonnaise or something similar rather than milk. Works like a charm.

    Angie, I’m gonna give this recipe a try!

    Reply
  18. Melissa says

    October 10, 2016 at 6:32 pm

    I made this tonight! SO GOOD! I wasn’t a huge fan of the sauce, so I’ll omit that next time

    Reply

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