Low Carb Pesto Chicken Recipe
![slicing pesto chicken on the dinner plate]()
This recipe is one of the easiest keto dinner recipes. As long as you remember to marinade the chicken a few hours or even the night before, the rest takes 2 minutes of your time and you let your oven do the rest. But I have even forgotten to marinade the chicken before and just threw everything in a pan. It was STILL delicious! Definitely, give the flavors time to meld together if you have the time though.
Keto pesto chicken only requires four ingredients and it’s prepared in one dish (if you are using a plastic bag or marinade the chicken in the baking dish), so clean up is easy too! This easy keto dinner recipe is one I often turn to on week day nights.
The chicken is juicy and a balanced flavor between the pesto and the vinegar.
Chicken on the Keto Diet
![chicken thighs in a bowl]()
On the keto diet, the best cuts of chicken are the darker meats like chicken thighs and drumsticks since they have a higher fat content compared to white cuts of chicken meat, like the breast. I prefer chicken thighs to chicken breast since the thighs tend to have more flavor than the breast meat. Remember fat = flavor! However, if chicken breast is all you have, you can use them in this recipe. You may have to adjust the cooking time as chicken breast meat tends to be thicker. Chicken breast needs to be cooked to an internal temperature of 165 degrees fahrenheit as well.
Pesto on the Keto Diet
![mezzetta pesto]()
Most pesto is considered keto friendly since it is mostly made up of basil, garlic, parmesan cheese, salt and olive oil. I do recommend looking at the ingredient list and carbohydrate count since some manufacturers like to sneak in sugar in their pesto. My favorite brand of pesto is by Mezzetta. It contains no added sugar and is zero net carbs per serving.
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Rice Vinegar
When selecting a rice vinegar for this recipe, look for one without an sugar in it. Some brand add sugar to the rice vinegar. The brand of rice vinegar I like to use is by Marukan. It is the green labelled one and is sugar free.
![chicken marinading in pesto and vinegar]()
Ways to Use Leftover Keto Pesto Chicken
I like to make a bunch of keto pesto chicken and use the leftovers in other low carb recipes throughout the week. You can add leftover pesto chicken to zoodles and pasta sauce to make a chicken spaghetti or top it on fathead dough to make Keto Chicken Pesto Pizza (recipe coming soon!).
