Shamelessly easy and adored by kids and adults alike, this simple yet satisfying zero-carb recipe is sure to become your favorite dinner! And you can vary (and season) it to your heart’s content, so feel free to get creative with it. Which version are you going to make next?
Tips for making the Bacon and Cheese Stuffed Rolled Chicken
This dish is very quick and easy to pull together, but there are a couple of things that really make it shine:
Remember to bring the chicken to room temperature 30-60 minutes before starting to prepare the dish.
When pounding the chicken breasts, don’t pound them so thin that holes appear in the flattened breasts. (That’s purely aesthetic, though; the dish will still taste great, holes or not! And besides, when the chicken breasts are rolled up, you’ll hardly be able to see any holes. Still, no need to go crazy when flattening them.)
So, let’s take a look at how to prepare this super-tasty dish:
Preheat the oven to 350 °F (175 °C). Take the chicken breasts and pound them until they’re 1/2 inch (1.2 cm) thick…
…like this.
Sprinkle some onion powder on top of each pounded chicken breast, using about 1/4 teaspoon per breast.
Place 1-2 bacon slices on top of each chicken breast. If you have smaller breasts (seriously, I’m talking about the chicken here!), one slice of bacon is enough, and you can fold it so that it covers the entire chicken breast.
Place a slice of Cheddar on top of the bacon.
Roll each chicken breast up tightly.
Place the rolls into a glass or ceramic baking dish, seam side down.
Once all the rolls are in place, top each with a slice of Cheddar cheese.
Bake in the preheated oven for 30-40 minutes, or until the juices run clear. Remove from the oven, let set 5 minutes, and serve.
My rolled chicken experiments
I’ve made lots of variations on rolled chicken stuffed with different ingredients. One of the simplest and most flavorful versions was this Blue Cheese Stuffed and Bacon Wrapped Rolled Chicken that I posted on Facebook a few years ago.
It was wrapped in bacon (I think I was going through a phase where I was wrapping just about everything in bacon!), but I was also pondering how bacon would taste inside the roll. It wouldn’t get crispy—but did that really matter, I wondered? Ultimately, I decided it wouldn’t: after all, it’s the taste that counts!
But for this version, I needed another ingredient in addition to bacon. Cheese would be a natural accompaniment for it, but what kind of cheese would work best? Lidl had the answer. Since it’s summertime—that is, grilling season—Lidl is selling beautiful, thick slices of Cheddar cheese that are perfect for, say, topping a hamburger.
That was a start! Bacon and Cheddar cheese make a tasty pair and lend flavor to the neutral-tasting chicken. But do they lend enough flavor? Could I pep things up even more by adding some seasoning?
So I decided to try out my all-time favorite seasoning: onion powder. It adds an extra dimension to almost any savory dish. Moreover, it’s very handy, especially when you compare it with fresh onion: You don’t have to chop anything (and cry your eyes out in the process). Just open the jar, add a teaspoon or two of onion powder, and you’re good to go!
Then, when my husband was sampling one of my experiments, he decided to add some liquid smoke as seasoning. That seemed to be a great fit. And it occurred to me that you can actually grill these rolled chicken breasts for an authentic smoky flavor—no need to get it out of a bottle! (Besides—bacon, cheese, and a grill: Can dinner get any better than that!?)
On my first experiment, I added heavy cream to the dish to make a rich sauce. But the result was too runny (plus the cream separated…), and I wasn’t very happy with it, though it was tasty and my family really liked it.
In another experiment, I added a pat of butter on top of the rolled chicken breasts just before putting them in the oven. Nice, yes, but the butter didn’t really bring anything special to the dish.
I was happiest with the experiment in which I placed a slice of Cheddar cheese on top of each rolled chicken breast. It looked beautiful when it came out of the oven all golden and bubbly, and it was the perfect finishing touch.
- 4 skinless chicken breasts (1 1/2 lbs = 680 g)
- 4-8 slices bacon
- 4-8 slices Cheddar cheese
- 1 teaspoon onion powder (or other favorite seasoning, like smoked paprika, garlic powder, Cajun seasoning, barbecue seasoning, chipotle, thyme)
- unrefined sea salt or Himalayan salt and pepper to taste
- Preheat the oven to 350 °F (175 °C).
- Pound the chicken breasts until thin, working from the center of the meat outwards.
- Sprinkle the onion powder evenly on top of each chicken breast, using 1/4 teaspoon onion powder per chicken breast.
- Place 1-2 bacon slices on each chicken breast, depending on the size of the breast.
- Place 1 cheese slice on each chicken breast, over the bacon.
- Roll the chicken breasts into tight rolls. Place the rolls into a glass or ceramic baking dish, seam side down.
- Place 1/2-1 slice Cheddar cheese on each chicken breast roll.
- Bake in the preheated oven for 30-40 minutes, or until the juices run clear.
- Remove from the oven, let set 5 minutes, and serve.
| Nutrition information | Protein | Fat | Net carbs | kcal |
| In total: | 185.9 g | 99.7 g | 0.6 g | 1643 kcal |
| Per serving if 4 servings in total: | 46.5 g | 24.9 g | 0.2 g | 411 kcal |
Tips for variation
This is a wonderfully flexible dish in the sense that you can vary it endlessly. Just change up the seasoning for instant novelty: try smoked paprika, chipotle, crushed garlic cloves, and thyme. Seasoning mixes like taco seasoning, Cajun seasoning, and barbecue seasoning suit perfectly, too.
Naturally, you can fill the chicken rolls with something other than bacon and Cheddar. How about blue cheese and onion powder? Sun-dried tomatoes and fresh basil leaves? Cream cheese and chopped chives? Thinly sliced tomato, mozzarella, and oregano? (I bet you’re drooling already!)
And of course, like in my Facebook post, you can still wrap the stuffed chicken breasts in bacon for extra flavor (and to keep the chicken extra-tender). Major yum!
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