Chicken Florentine Artichoke Bake

By vealam

Ingredients

• 8 ounces rotini pasta
• 1 1/4 cups milk
• 2 large eggs
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1/2 teaspoon dried basil
• 1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
• Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
• 1 (12.5-ounce) can premium chunk white chicken, drained
• 1 1/2 cups shredded Monterey Jack cheese
• 1 (14-ounce) can quartered artichoke hearts, drained
• 1 (10-ounce) package frozen chopped spinach, thawed and well-drained
• 1/3 cup julienned sun dried tomatoes in olive oil, drained
• 2 tablespoons freshly grated Parmesan cheese
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1/2 cup Panko*

Details

Servings 6
Preparation time 10mins
Cooking time 30mins
Adapted from damndelicious.net

Preparation

Step 1

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly oil a 9x13 baking dish or coat with nonstick spray.

In a large pot of boiling salted water, cook pasta according to package instructions; drain well.

In a large bowl, whisk together milk, eggs, garlic, oregano, basil and red pepper flakes; season with salt and pepper, to taste. Stir in chicken, Monterey Jack cheese, artichokes, spinach, sun dried tomatoes, Parmesan and pasta.

Add pasta mixture to prepared baking dish. Place into oven and bake until cooked through and golden brown, about 18-20 minutes.

Heat olive in a large skillet over medium high heat. Add Panko and cook, stirring, until browned and toasted, about 3 minutes; set aside.

I’ve been eating artichokes straight out of the jar recently. Obsessed. I should probably make this so I can enjoy them and at least pretend to be a normal person.

I could live off artichokes (especially in dip form or mixed with cheese!) and love sundried tomatoes! This is a winner! And Butters…tooo cuuuuuute!

If you will be omitting the chicken, I recommend substituting additional vegetables, to taste.

Hi there, this recipe sounds wonderful and I want to make it. If I was to use fresh cut up cooked chicken, would I still use the same amount? Or, do you use canned chicken because you need the liquid from it as well? Love your recipes. Thanks.

Rotini pasta is my favorite! Can’t wait to add sun dried tomatoes, artichokes and cheeeese to it

use fresh spinach but because they are not broken down, you would have to significantly reduce the amount of spinach to make sure everything would fit in the baking dish.

If I were going to use fresh spinach, I would use a trick I learned when using fresh kale when pasta is included. I put the kale (or in this case spinach) in the colander then poor the pasta and all the boiling water from the pasta over it when I am draining the cooked pasta. Does that make sense? It will wilt your kale/spinach so it will fit better in the casserole.

This looks fantastic Chungah! I made a bake the other week as well, and it always makes for such a lovely, hearty feelgood meal

Why used canned chicken? Simply bake or saute a few chicken breasts or thighs (or a combo) chop and freeze in one cup portions, pull out as needed, defrost and add to recipe.

Elizabeth – we all have our own preferences. If you prefer to use frozen-defrosted chicken, that’s great! I personally like to use canned chicken from time to time because it just makes prep time so much easier!

Ahhhhh…totally comforting and love adding Panko on top.

I’m so glad you gave this a try! And yes, draining the spinach is very important in a recipe like this since frozen spinach does retain quite a bit of water. As for freezing, unfortunately, I cannot answer this with certainty as I have never tried freezing this myself – there were no leftovers left to freeze! I recommend using your best judgment for freezing and reheating.

I would suggest not putting the panko crumbs on until taking it out of the frig. While in the frig, the crumbs will absorb moisture and it could make more of a crust when baked than the lovely crumbly topping shown on the beautiful pictures here.

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