Many years ago, I went to work for a company that was in process of relocating from New York City to Dallas. They temporarily moved me and a coworker (who I didn’t meet until we were at the airport) to train in NY for several weeks. We had the opportunity to work in the city and explore like tourists after work. We had a blast. We lived in a great apartment at 53^rd & 7^th. There was a Ray’s Pizza on the 1^st floor of our building that seemed to stay open all night – and we didn’t mind one bit. This was long before my Kosher-keeping days.

One evening, a NY coworker offered to cook us dinner. He banged around in our kitchen for a while and finally came out with the most unbelievable food. It was my first experience with Chicken Cordon Bleu and I was in love. It was the most juicy, yummy chicken (and ham and cheese) I’d ever tasted. Said coworker later taught me how to make this amazing chicken and I prepared that dish several times later before starting to keep Kosher. Of all the foods I miss now, Chicken Cordon Bleu has to be at the top of my list.

I’ve been thinking about recreating Chicken Cordon Bleu in a kosher form for some time now and finally got around to trying it for Friday night dinner this past week. When I did a Google search, I found a kosher version on the Joy of Kosher site by Ahuva Staum but she used a mayonnaise based dressing as a substitute for the cheese. I wasn’t ready to give up on the cheese part of this dish so I found a regular recipe for Chicken Cordon Bleu on Allrecipes.com and combined the two. Here’s how it went:

Kosher Chicken Cordon Bleu

•  4 or 5 skinless, boneless chicken breasts
• Slices of deli meat. (I used 3 thin pieces of Salami in each chicken breast)
• Pareve Soy cheese (I used Follow your Heart Vegan Gourmet Mozzarella)
• 2 eggs beaten
• 1 cup white flour
• 1 cup breadcrumbs
• 1 cup Panko
• Spices to taste (I used salt & pepper)

So freaky to see chicken, salami and cheese all together when prepping a Kosher Dish! OK, the cheese is fake : )

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Coat a 9 x 11 baking dish with nonstick cooking spray.
2. Fold parchment paper around chicken breasts and pound them to ¼ inch thickness. Be careful not to rip the flesh.
3. Mix together the breading mix, spicing to your taste – white flour, breadcrumbs, Panko and spices such as salt, pepper, Italian seasonings.
4. Sprinkle each chicken breast on both sides with salt and pepper. Place 1 slice “mock” cheese and 3 slices of deli meat (salami) on top of each breast.  Roll up each breast, and secure with toothpicks. The Vegan Gourmet Mozzarella comes in a block so I sliced it into fairly thick slices about ¼” thick. I wrapped 3 thin slices of the Salami around the slice of cheese and added to center of chicken breast.
5. Gently  dip each rolled chicken breast into the egg and then roll in the breading  mix until completely covered and lay in your 9 x 11 baking dish. Lightly spray each breast with Pam or other cooking spray.
6. Now  here’s where I was a bit lazy. The Joy of  Kosher recipe says to fry the Chicken Cordon Bleu and this is exactly how I was taught to make it back in NY but I wasn’t in the mood to deal with flying grease so I chose the baking method from the All Recipes directions. I think the chicken would have turned out better  if I’d gone the frying route and I will definitely try this next time.
7. Bake  for 30 – 35 minutes or until chicken is no longer pink. Remove from oven and place ½ cheese slice on top of each breast. Return to oven for 3 to 5  minutes or until cheese has melted. I ended up having to broil the chicken on high for about 3 minutes to get the cheese to melt. That darn pareve cheese is stubborn.
8. Remove  toothpicks and serve immediately. Now I learned an interesting lesson when I removed the toothpicks and you can probably see it in the photo. I used colored toothpicks so the chicken has some blue spots on it where I inserted blue toothpicks. So good rule to remember … don’t use colored toothpicks : )

The Verdict

Overall, it was not a bad first attempt at making Kosher Chicken Cordon Bleu. The cheese inside the chicken breasts did not melt so that yummy, oozing cheese/salami mixture was definitely missing. And the breading was not as crispy as I remember from my Treif days. I’m wondering if frying would have taken care of both of those problems.

I’m thinking for the next round, I might use the same cheese, which has a nice taste by the way, and also add the mayonnaise mixture that Ahuva Staum suggested. Also, the original Chicken Cordon Bleu recipe calls for Swiss cheese and I couldn’t find a mock Swiss cheese at Wholefoods but I love Mozzarella so went with that.

Have any of you attempted Kosher Chicken Cordon Bleu? If so, please share how you made it.

Happy Kosher Treif Cooking!