A simple roasted chicken dish is this one, which uses potatoes and leeks for health! This dish, which is loaded with potatoes and leeks, is gluten-free, tasty, and easy to prepare ahead of time and then bake in the oven.
Does anyone else like a simple dinner? One that requires quick, uncomplicated preparation, after which you just place everything in the oven and watch it work its magic? Likewise. That’s precisely what this Potato Bake with Leek and Chicken is healthy! baked chicken paired with savory but light lemon-thyme vinaigrette and fresh leeks and potatoes. A set-it-and-forget sort of meal, but one that requires some preparation time—a baked chicken supper free of gluten.
Ingredients Needed
- Chicken: For this dish, we really adore chicken breasts. Although boneless thighs would cook faster than the potatoes, bone-in thighs will also work for this cooking time.
- Leeks: I’ve noticed that we don’t cook with leeks nearly enough every time I use them! Their flavor of sweet onions goes well with chicken, potatoes, and thyme!
- Garlic and Onion: More Allums! Because onions, garlic, and leeks taste so good together. Since white onions are our preference, we use them, but sweet yellow onions would also work well.
- Potatoes: Any type of potato would work well for this, but tiny red potatoes are our favorite. Just be sure to chop them up small—roughly 1-1/2 inches—to guarantee that they are all thoroughly cooked.
- Spices: salt and pepper, of course, but also lots of thyme and a tiny bit of ground mustard, which enhances the taste of the leeks and thyme so well!
- To make your vinaigrette and toss everything together, combine olive oil and lemon juice. For a vinaigrette, extra virgin olive oil works best, and we usually use a premium olive oil like this one.
Step-by-Step Instructions
Make sure your leeks are always clean!
The first thing to do is to remove any tiny particles of dirt that could be hiding between your lovely leeks’ layers. Just cut off the white and light green portions of the leek and soak them in water to achieve that. You may choppity chop your small potatoes in the meanwhile.
Mixture
This is where all of the vibrant, fresh taste that so wonderfully accentuates each ingredient in this nutritious chicken bake originates.
Combine everything.
Place all of the washed leeks, potatoes, onion, and garlic in a bowl and well mix in the vinaigrette.
Put the chicken in a baking dish after seasoning it.
Season the chicken well and transfer it to your baking dish. To help it cook more quickly, make sure your chicken is resting on the bottom of the oven dish.
Cook!
Baked for 45–60 minutes (depending on the side of the chicken breasts), this healthy chicken leek and potato dish is bright and airy. Bake with delicate, flavorful, springtime potatoes, leeks, and juicy chicken breasts!
Baking Tips
chopping leeks
When chopping leeks, you want to snip off the root end and slice the leek into rounds right before it turns a dark green color. The tender sections of leeks are all white or pale green in color.
Chicken size will impact baking time.
Have you noticed that chicken breasts, especially organic ones, are growing astronomically enormous lately? For this dish, we sometimes split the large breasts in half to reduce the cooking time because they will take longer. We constantly make sure the chicken has attained an internal temperature of at least 165 degrees by using our Instant Read Thermometer.
Fresh vs Dried Thyme
Naturally, both are quite effective. One tablespoon fresh thyme equals one teaspoon of dry thyme. Since it takes a lot of work to remove two tablespoons of fresh thyme from those tiny little branches, we prefer to use largely dried in this recipe!
Maintain uniform potato sizes.
As there’s nothing worse than having a meal where some potatoes are fully cooked and others aren’t, this will also guarantee even cooking.
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- Easy Vegetarian Chickpea Stew
Healthy Chicken Leek and Potato Bake
Ingredients
- 2 lbs chicken breasts
- 3 leeks approximately 4 cups when sliced
- 1 lb small red potatoes
- 1 lg onion
- 4 garlic cloves peeled
- 1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
- 1/4 cup lemon juice
- 3 teaspoons dried thyme divided
- 2 3/4 teaspoons kosher salt divided
- 1 1/4 teaspoon ground mustard
- 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
Instructions
- Set oven temperature to 375 degrees.
- Take the leeks’ root off. Cut into thin rounds until the leek’s dark green portion is almost reached. Place the rounds in a big dish, making sure to press them apart as you do so. Pour cold water into the basin and soak the leeks for ten minutes.
- In the meantime, cut the little potatoes into uniformly sized chunks or quarters, approximately 1 inch. Slice the onion and reserve.
- To prepare the vinaigrette, fill a small bowl with pyrek with a pour spout and add olive oil, lemon juice, 1 3/4 teaspoons kosher salt, 2 tablespoons thyme, and powdered mustard. Mix vigorously.
- One teaspoon kosher salt, one-fourth teaspoon black pepper, and one teaspoon thyme are used to season the chicken breasts on both sides. Transfer to a baking dish.
- Remove the leeks. Put the potatoes, onions, and peeled garlic cloves back into the bowl. Blend.
- After giving the vinaigrette one more whisk, pour it into the bowl, then thoroughly mix to coat the potatoes and leeks. In case the salt has sank to the bottom of the plate, make sure you pour it all over. Add to the dish around the chicken.
- Bake the chicken for 45 minutes to 1 hour, or until the internal temperature reaches 165 degrees.
- Have fun!
Notes
- It will depend on how big your chicken breasts are. Cut in half if the breasts are particularly large—nearly a pound apiece. Cooking time will probably be closer to 45 minutes if utilizing half breasts.
- Chicken: Bone-in chicken thighs can also be used; they will need to cook for 60 to 75 minutes to be done. Make sure your chicken is always at least 165 degrees inside by checking the temperature at the thickest area.
- Pick your favorite potato! Just make sure you chop them into uniformly little pieces, around 1 inch.
- Pick your favorite onion!
- Dice or chop the garlic if you’d like.
- For every teaspoon of dried thyme, use one tablespoon of fresh thyme.
- Salt: Replace 1 1/2 teaspoons of kosher salt with 1 1/4 teaspoons of normal table salt. Alternately, use 3/4 teaspoon table salt for every 1 teaspoon kosher salt.