Daily Favorites: Buffalo Chicken Bake

This little I dish I created only has four ingredients, and three are super ingredients. The result is a very filling meal that comes in at 400 calories. 

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Once I got my food scale, a few things surprised me. The first was how little you get in a serving of chicken strips (or any breaded chicken like popcorn chicken, nuggets, etc.) One chicken strip out of the bag is usually over 84 grams, so over the 190 cal serving. You can still have two strips for 500 cals or less, but you have to be careful that you're not underestimating if you don't weigh them. 

On the other hand, I'm amazed at how much non-breaded chicken you get in an 84 gram serving that comes in at 100 calories. I've started measuring out 168 grams of frozen chicken breast (strips, cubes, shredded) for 200 calories and it's a lot. So that's the first super ingredient here.

Buffalo chicken dip is typically made with an entire package of cream cheese. Instead of adding 800 calories of cream cheese, I added 40 calories of nonfat greek yogurt. Still provides creaminess and a pleasant tanginess. Super ingredient #2. 

And then there's a lot of buffalo sauces out there and most are zero-calorie. I use Frank's RedHot Wings sauce because it has a great buffalo flavor, medium heat, and a thicker consistency than just hot sauce to adhere to chicken better. You could use any zero-cal hot sauce you wanted here. Super ingredient #3. 

The other ingredient here is shredded mozzarella. I've started keeping it on hand to make pita pizzas anytime. While not a super ingredient, it does only have 80 calories per serving compared to 100 or 110 for many other cheeses. 

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168g chicken (200 cals)

70g nonfat plain greek yogurt (40 cals)

45g buffalo sauce (0 cals)

28g mozzarella (80 cals) mixed-in

28g mozzarella (80 cals) topping

I microwaved the chicken and seasoned with garlic+ and ranch powder. Stirred together the greek yogurt and buffalo sauce, no heating required there. Combined the chicken, creamy buffalo sauce, and one serving of mozzarella. (By the way, the creamy buffalo sauce is very good and would be good on anything as a dipping sauce, burger sauce, etc. Although I often just use the 0-cal buffalo sauce straight up, so either way is good.) 

I got my tiny casserole dish and gave it a little non-stick spray. Poured in the chicken/sauce/cheese mixture and topped with another serving of cheese. Baked for 12 minutes at 350F. My cheese hadn't browned yet, so I turned the broiler on high until it got some browning, about 2 more minutes. 

Delicious buffalo chicken flavor. Strangely, the cheese topping felt kind of unnecessary. Most importantly, I ate it like lasagna, no dipping of chips or crackers that would crush the nutritional value. 

It was super filling and I thought about saving some for later, before remembering it's only 400 calories and polishing it off.