Mustard Chicken Pasta Bake - AllRecipes AU!

This is a recipe brought to you from the AllRecipes Australia/New Zealand website! I had a great time browsing through the many possibilities from the AR AU site and trying to find something that my family would enjoy, and that I had ingredients available from! I noticed a few "themes" while I was browsing. Tomatoes, mozzarella cheese, and baked beans. :) We settled on Mustard Chicken Pasta Bake to test out in our kitchen and were pretty happy with the results. This made a very large pan of pasta and chicken, enough for our family of 3 to eat on for at least 3 meals!

It is important to make sure your chicken is pounded somewhat thin, or slice in half, to ensure that when you're frying it you're able to cook it all the way (or almost completely all the way) through without burning the crumb coating. I had issues with my thicker pieces of chicken still being pink in the middle even after their time in the frying pan, and the oven.

I made a few tweaks (such as sautéing the onions for a few minutes before adding in the other sauce ingredients) and those are reflected below. I thought this was a great dish for "the guys" - lots of meat, pasta, and BBQ-ey sauce to go around! If you like BBQ flavor and saucy pasta and chicken dishes, you will probably like this one too! We used Dijon mustard which gave the sauce a tang - if you prefer sweeter, try honey mustard! I really liked the texture of the chicken in this dish, the coating and frying process made it tender and juicy.

We served this with some steamed veggies on the side.

Mustard Chicken Pasta Bake adapted from Anthony D'Onofrio on AllRecipes AU

Ingredients

1 13-oz box penne pasta

2 eggs

1/2 cup milk

1 pinch salt and pepper, to taste

1 1/2 lbs skinless, boneless chicken breast halves, pounded thin or sliced in half

1 cup breadcrumbs

1/2 cup olive oil

2 tablespoons butter

4-5 large/thick slices bacon

2 med/lg tomatoes, diced

1  med onion, diced

1 12-oz bottle honey barbecue sauce

3 TBS Dijon mustard

1 1/2 cups grated cheddar cheese

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
2. Bring a large saucepan of lightly salted water to a boil. Add pasta and cook for 8 to 10 minutes or until al dente; drain. Pour into a deep 9x13 baking dish.
3. Meanwhile, in a medium bowl whisk together the eggs and milk. Season with salt and pepper.
4. Dip the chicken breasts in the egg mixture then roll in breadcrumbs to coat.
5. Heat the olive oil and butter in a large frying pan over medium-high heat. Fry chicken breasts until the juices run clear and they are well browned on both sides (about 5-10 minutes per side). Be sure to cook them well, but be careful not to burn the breading. Remove to paper towels to drain. Drain all but about 1 TBS of excess oil from frying pan.
6. While the chicken is cooking, place bacon in another large deep frying pan. Cook over medium-high heat until crisp. Remove bacon from frying pan, pat to remove excess grease, then crumble and set aside.
7. Return the frying pan that had the chicken in it to medium heat. Add the onion and sauté for 5-10 minutes, or until beginning to soften and get translucent. Add tomato and cooked bacon, then cook for about 5 minutes or until onion is completely tender. 
8. Pour in the barbecue sauce and mustard. Simmer for 5 minutes. Pour the sauce over the pasta in the dish then place the chicken on the top and cover with grated cheese.
9. Cover with foil and bake for 25 minutes in the preheated oven. Remove foil, return to oven until cheese is completely melted, chicken is no longer pink in the middle, and dish is heated through.