I've been dying to post this keto chicken roulade recipe on the site; aside from being delicious, roulades always look so cool! The ultimate food porn, through and through. Something about meat in a spiral does it for me, I guess. I never had much luck maintaining the pretty circular shape of a roulade, let alone getting perfectly cooked chicken until I started using an immersion circulator instead of the oven. Game changer! Cooking sous vide makes this so freakin' easy! I made a homemade low carb spinach basil pesto to roll into the chicken, and it's officially bomb.com.
Don't forget to PIN it for later! ?
Cooking Keto Sous Vide Style
Not sure what sous vide is, let alone an immersion circulator? In a nutshell, sous vide is a cooking method that targets a precise temperature via water bath circulating around the food in an airtight container of some sort.
Typically, the airtight container is a vacuum sealed pouch, but sometimes it's a Ziploc bag, saran wrap, or a mason jar. An immersion circulator is a fancy little kitchen gadget that heats the water bath and maintains an accurate and stable temperature.
When you cook something sous vide, you can nail the perfect temperature for that specific food. Your meat will never be under-cooked, over-cooked, or super tough on the outside while the inside remains rare as can be; it's consistently cooked all the way through at your preferred temperature.
For dishes like my keto chicken roulade, where the meat is rolled up into several different layers, sous vide evenly distributes the heat, so each layer reaches the perfect temperature.
I personally have (and LOVE! ?) this immersion circulator by Anova. It's super easy to use, takes up hardly any space, and makes cooking sous vide at home surprisingly practical. You can even make desserts, like my keto chocolate pots de creme! Keto sous vide recipes have been more convenient and approachable than I ever imagined.
When I first took an interest in sous vide, I was looking at DIY rigs made with water coolers, various clamps, clips, and thermometers. It all seemed... so complicated. Once I finally picked up the Anova immersion circulator, it quickly became one of my favorite kitchen gadgets and took all the guesswork out of the process. You just plug it in, set it up in your water bath at the desired temperature, and pop your food in. Easy! They even have an app that syncs up with your phone.
I'm clearly obsessed.
To top that? My friend and fellow keto babe, chef Nicole Poirier, does a ton of their recipe development. When you browse recipes in the app, most of hers have been crafted with low carb dieters in mind! I'm continually trying her new creations and have never been disappointed. So if you're looking for more keto sous vide recipes, be sure to look her up!
Keto Chicken Roulade Recipe
First thing's first, prepare your water bath and set it to 140 degrees Fahrenheit.
For the low carb pesto, add fresh basil, thawed frozen spinach, Parmesan cheese, olive oil, garlic, and salt to a food processor or blender. You can use fresh spinach, but you'll need to add about a tablespoon of water to provide a little extra moisture. Blend until it starts to resemble... pesto! You may need to scrape down the sides in between blender pulses, but this shouldn't take more than a couple of minutes.
To prepare your chicken for the roulade, you will need to butterfly each chicken breast. Essentially, you take a sharp blade and run it horizontally down the center of the breast until you reach the opposite edge. You'll leave this edge whole and splay open the chicken breast; the two halves will remain connected in a butterfly shape.
Place the butterflied chicken breast in between two sheets of plastic wrap and hammer the meat with the flat side of a meat tenderizer until it's about ¼ inch thick.
Spread the spinach basil pesto over the flattened chicken breast. Roll the chicken up starting at the narrowest edge, wrapping over and into the pesto filling as you go, ultimately forming a cylindrical shape. Place chicken at the side of a roll of plastic wrap and roll it tightly over and over. This process will take multiple turns to get a tight enough seal, about 10-15 layers of wrapping.
Cut the plastic wrap from the roll and tightly twist the ends together on each side, like so:
Place your plastic wrapped chicken into the 140 degrees F water bath and cook for 1.5 hours. When the time is up, carefully remove the chicken from the water (remember: it's not boiling, but it's still hot AF!). Remove the plastic wrap from each chicken roulade and generously season with salt and pepper.
Turn your oven broiler on high and pop the chicken roulades in an oven-safe dish. Throw the dish under the broiler for a few minutes to get a beautiful, golden color on the outside. Remove from the oven and let the chicken rest about 5-10 minutes before cutting. Slice to 1-inch pieces and enjoy your keto chicken roulade!
![Keto Chicken Roulade with Basil Spinach Pesto Stuffing [Low Carb, Gluten Free]](https://cdn.ketogasm.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/keto-chicken-roulade-spinach-basil-pesto-low-carb-recipe-3.jpg.webp)
Ingredients
- 2 chicken breasts large, raw, boneless, skinless
- 1 ½ cups fresh basil leaves
- ⅓ cup spinach frozen & thawed
- ¼ cup Parmesan fresh, finely grated
- ¼ cup olive oil
- 1 clove garlic minced
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon black pepper ground
- Additional salt to taste
Instructions
- Prepare sous vide water bath at 140 degrees Fahrenheit.
- Butterfly two chicken breasts.
- Place chicken breast between two sheets of plastic wrap. Using flat side of meat tenderizer, flatten chicken down to ¼ inch thickness.
- For the pesto, combine basil, spinach, Parmesan, olive oil, garlic, and salt in a food processor or blender. Pulse and scrape down sides to ensure all ingredients are thoroughly incorporated.
- Divide the pesto mixture between the two butterflied chicken breasts. Evenly distribute mixture on top of each breast.
- Roll up the chicken breast, starting at the narrowest edge and fold over like a jelly roll, enclosing the pesto as you go.
- Roll chicken roulade in multiple layers of plastic wrap (10-15) and secure each end by tightly twisting.
- Place chicken roulade in sous vide water bath for 1.5 hours.
- Remove chicken roulade from water bath and remove plastic wrap.
- Place chicken roulade under the oven broiler on high for several minutes to get a golden color on the outside.
- Let meat rest 5-10 minutes and slice into 1-inch pieces to serve.
Nutrition
Hi, I'm Tasha–nutritionist, recipe developer, and multi-published cookbook author.
Your spinach pesto recipe looks great! But I don't have the cooking utensil you have, can you give us another way to cook this delish dish?