Cheesy Chicken Melts with Red Pepper Jelly
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Cheesy Chicken Melts recipe is an easy meal idea made with slices of bread, pepper jelly and chicken topped with 100% real, natural cheese from Sargento.
Need a new go-to recipe for busy weeknights? This recipe for Cheesy Chicken Melts is one of our favorites. It’s a super easy dinner made with slices of bread, red pepper jelly and chicken topped with melted cheese.
Cheese lovers, we’ve got a fantastic recipe for you today! If you love to feed your family super simple meals made with 100% real ingredients, you are going to love this cheesy chicken melts recipe.
A Super-Fast Dinner Ideas
If your family is like ours, life gets busy. My husband, Kent and I are often rushing around at the end of a long day of work and running our boys back and forth to school and events. More often than not, we’re scrambling to get a hot dinner on the table, but we don’t want to compromise on quality. Cheesy Chicken Melts are one of our family’s favorite “go-to” meals, the kind we make when we didn’t have time to think about what to make for dinner.
Only takes 15 minutes to make
We can seriously have these Cheesy Chicken Melts on our table in just 15 minutes. We added red pepper jelly and dried cranberries to give them a sweet and tangy flavor, but you can easily omit those ingredients if your family doesn’t care for them.
What you need:
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Kitchen Tools Needed:
Ingredients Needed:
Here’s what you’ll need from the store. The exact amounts are in the printable recipe card at the bottom of this post.
- Chunked canned chicken breast
- Mayonnaise
- Yellow mustard
- Celery Salt
- Black Pepper
- Garlic Powder
- Salt
- Dried cranberries, optional
- Whole grain bread
- Red pepper jelly
- Sargento® Natural Provolone Cheese
How to make cheesy chicken melts
The entire recipe is in the printable card at the bottom of this post. I included some step-by-step pictures too. This way, you can follow along as you make it yourself.
1. Put the ingredients in a bowl
To make these easy Cheesy Chicken Melts, you just combine canned or shredded chicken in a small bowl with mayonnaise, yellow mustard, dried cranberries and some spices.
2. Spread red pepper jelly on top of the bread
Next spread red pepper jelly on top of whole wheat bread. We like ours to be really flavorful so we use quite a bit of red pepper jelly on each slice.
3. spread the chicken mixture on the bread slices
After that, you divide the chicken mixture between the whole wheat bread slices.
4. Top with a slice of provolone cheese
Then top each one with a slice of your favorite Sargento® 100% real, natural cheese. We used Sargento® Natural Provolone Cheese for our Cheesy Chicken Melts. However, the best part about this recipe is that you can really experiment with the flavor by trying any of the 23 delicious varieties of natural cheese that Sargento® offers like colby jack, swiss or sharp cheddar.
5. Toast the bread
Pop the Cheesy Chicken Melts in a conventional or toaster oven for 7-10 minutes or until the cheese is melted – and voila! You’ve got yourself a delicious family dinner in hardly any time at all.
Before you go, check out these other Easy Dinner Ideas!
Cheesy Chicken Melts with Red Pepper Jelly
Equipment
- Oven
- Baking Sheet
- Alumnium Foil
Ingredients
- 1 can chunked chicken breast 12.5 oz can
- 1/2 cup mayonnaise
- 1 1/2 teaspoons yellow mustard
- 1/8 teaspoon Celery Salt
- 1/4 teaspoon Black Pepper
- 1/8 teaspoon Garlic Powder
- 1/8 teaspoon Salt
- 1/3 cup dried cranberries optional
- 4 slices of whole grain bread
- 4 tablespoons of red pepper jelly
- 4 slices Sargento® Natural Provolone Cheese
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.
- In a small bowl, combine chicken, mayonnaise, mustard, celery salt, black pepper, garlic powder and salt. Add dried cranberries, if you’d like. Mix well and set aside.
- Line a baking sheet with aluminum foil and lightly grease it with cooking spray. Place slices of bread in a single layer on the baking sheet.
- Spread red pepper jelly on each slice of bread, approximately 1 tablespoon per slice.
- Divide the chicken salad evenly between the four slices of bread. Top each one with a slice of Sargento® Natural Provolone Cheese.
- Bake for 7-10 minutes or until the Sargento® cheese is melted. Enjoy!
Notes
Nutrition
Serving Suggestions for Cheesy Chicken Melts
While Cheesy Chicken Melts are incredibly quick and easy to make, there are also a variety of ways you could modify this recipe to fit your family’s tastes.
- Give the Cheesy Chicken Melts a little crunch by adding finely chopped celery, onion or green pepper.
- To give your Cheesy Chicken Melts a bolder flavor try Sargento® Sharp Cheddar or Pepper Jack cheese. Sargento® Garlic and Herb Jack, Tomato and Basil Jack or Gouda would also be amazing on Cheesy Chicken Melts.
- Instead of whole grain bread, use something else like flatbread, focaccia, sour dough or french bread. In hindsight, we thought the Sargento® Provolone Cheese would have fit perfectly on an English muffin. We’ll have to try that next time!
- You could also top the Cheesy Chicken Melts with slices of ham and fried onions, like these Easy Chicken Cordon Bleu Melts we made.
- Serve the Cheesy Chicken Melts with a side salad, fresh fruit, or veggies and a glass of low-fat milk for a well rounded meal.
Get inspired with more delicious meal ideas using 100% real cheese by following Sargento® on Instagram and Facebook.
While you’re here be sure to check out these other easy meal ideas –
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Originally published October 2016. Updated May 2020.
I love the sweet and savory together – Looks good! Thanks for sharing on the What’s for Dinner Link up!
Me too, Helen! The red pepper jelly gives it a really nice flavor. I hope you enjoy it.
Thanks! I think it would be delicious with turkey!
Looks delish! I would probably do a version with my leftover Thanksgiving turkey. Thanks for sharing with us at THrowback Thursday and Happy Thanksgiving!
Mollie
I think this would be fantastic with Thanksgiving leftovers. Enjoy!