Our protein and veggie-packed healthy chicken parmesan quinoa casserole is a winner for all. It’s made with homemade parmesan chicken, marinara, mushrooms, and quinoa for an epic, kid-friendly chicken parmesan casserole.
This might be the quinoa casserole of all quinoa casserole recipes. If you like the combination of chicken and quinoa AND marinara sauce, then you are going to drool over this amazing chicken parmesan casserole. It feeds 6 people so it’s perfect for a family meal or to prep for a few meals throughout the week. Not to mention, it’s packed with protein and veggies. What more could you ask for? Cheese! Oh, and that too 🙂
Likes and Dislikes
Before we jump into this recipe, can we talk about likes and dislikes of food for a second? I have a VERYYYY short list of foods that I “dislike.” I’m not going to use the word hate because I’m hoping one day my taste buds change.
- olives – too salty
- eggplant – weird texture
- mushrooms – weird texture
3 foods on my dislike list and everything else is a thumbs up. I’d say that’s pretty stellar. The reason I bring these three foods up is because Linley convinced me that mushrooms needed to go in the base of the sauce. Obviously I was skeptical, but I was pleasantly surprised that I LOVED the flavor of the mushrooms in this dish and could barely taste their weird texture. So, if you’re on the fence about this chicken parmesan because of the ‘shrooms, I’m here to tell you that they’re pretty hidden and you’re going to love this parmesan chicken and quinoa casserole.
For this healthy chicken parmesan quinoa casserole, you literally throw everything in your ceramic baking dish completely RAW! Veggies, meat, quinoa…everything is raw. Then all you have to do is bake it for an hour. This seriously could not get easier.
How to Make Chicken Parmesan Casserole
Step 1: Prep Veggies
This recipe calls for onion, green pepper, and mushrooms. Finely dice 1/2 a yellow onion (any color will work) and then chop your pepper and mushrooms into small bite-sized pieces. Next, layer your veggies and quinoa onto the bottom of your casserole dish.
Step 2: Add Marinara and Broth
Create the base of your healthy chicken parmesan by adding in marinara and broth. For this step, if you’re hoping to turn this into a vegetarian-friendly recipe, use vegetable broth instead of chicken!
Step 3: Make Chicken Parmesan
In this step, you’re essentially preparing for baked parmesan crusted chicken. Here, you’ll need an egg wash (1 scrambled egg) and then your parmesan mixture. You can use any kind of flour you want. We’ve tested this with both whole wheat, all-purpose flour, and gluten-free flour. Dip each chicken breast in the egg wash and then right into the parmesan mixture. Make sure to be generous with the cheese part…I mean, the more cheese the merrier!
Vegetarian tip: If you’re going vegetarian, slice eggplant into 1/2 inch slices and follow this step just like the chicken.
Step 4: Bake Parmesan Chicken and Quinoa Casserole at 375ºF
The last step is simple! Cover your ceramic casserole dish with tin foil. Then, bake it at 375ºF for 40 minutes. Remove tin foil and bake again for an additional 20 minutes or until the quinoa is fully cooked.
Quinoa and Chicken Recipes
Looking for more quinoa recipes with chicken? Check out some of our favorites below!
- Tuscan Chicken Quinoa Bake
- Crockpot Chicken Quinoa Enchilada Soup
- Chicken Apple Sausage Quinoa Casserole
- Meal-Prep Chicken Cattiatore Quinoa Casserole
- White Chicken Quinoa Chili
Healthy Chicken Parmesan Quinoa Casserole
Ingredients
- 1 cup quinoa rinsed
- 1 medium green pepper diced
- 1.5 cup mushrooms diced
- 1/2 yellow onion finely diced (~1/2 cup)
- 3 cups Marinara Sauce any kind of spaghetti sauce will work!
- 1 cup low-sodium chicken broth option to sub: vegetable broth or water
- 1 tablespoon minced garlic
- 1 large egg
- 2 tablespoons flour I used white whole wheat, but white or gluten-free will work, too!
- 1 cup shredded parmesan cheese
- 2 teaspoons garlic powder
- 16 oz. boneless skinless chicken breast
- salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 375ºF and spray a 14-inch x 10-inch (OR 9-inch x 12-inch) ceramic casserole dish with cooking spray.
- Prep veggies by dicing a whole green pepper and 1.5 cups of mushrooms. Finely dice 1/2 a yellow onion.
- Place 1 cup of uncooked quinoa on the bottom of your casserole dish and then layer on veggies.
- Add 3 cups of marinara sauce, 1 cup of chicken broth, and a tablespoon of minced garlic to the casserole dish and mix everything together. Set aside.
- In a medium-size bowl, mix together flour, shredded parmesan, and garlic powder. Then, crack an egg into a small bowl and whisk.
- Prep chicken breast by dipping into the egg and then into the parmesan mixture making sure everything is generously coated. Place chicken breast on top of quinoa mixture
- Finally, sprinkle on the leftover parmesan mixture and even more cheese if you desire. Season with salt and pepper, to taste.
- Cover baking dish with tinfoil and then bake at 375ºF 40 minutes. Then, uncover the baking dish and bake for an additional 20 minutes or until quinoa is fully cooked.
Tips & Notes
- If you are making this recipe, a ceramic casserole dish is going to be your best bet. Ceramic dishes heat your food much hotter than a classic cake pan, so do note this with bake time! PS: here's the one we have.
- Vegetarian option: we tested this bad boy with eggplant (at least Linley did..I refused to eat it, okay fine I had a bite) and it was great! If you're a vegetarian...you are in luck! Just slice your eggplant hot dog way and follow the directions just like the chicken. You will still need to bake for the full 60 minutes because that's how long the quinoa will take to fluff.
Made this for dinner..didn’t have mushrooms and reduced the amount of marinara to 2 cups. It was very good, but next time, I’ll lightly sauté the onions first.
Made this last night for dinner and we both loved it! I was a little bit skeptical cooking the chicken for so long (was worried it would get dry) but it was perfect! I would make this one again
This was absolutely amazing. I was a little hesitant at first, just because it was the first time making it and you never know how new recipes will be when you’re cooking for your family. This was a winner and will be apart of our regular rotation now. Easy, healthy, and delicious which I absolutely love.
Aw, we’re blushing, Caitlin! So glad you and the fam enjoyed this casserole 😀
Help! I just realized that I don’t have any quinoa. Will multigrain rice work?
This was so tasty! I made it with canned chicken because that’s what I had on hand, so obviously that was a little weird, but that’s on me! We also opted to coat the chicken in ground-up garlic triscuits instead of Parmesan because we have dairy issues in our home. I’ve been looking for ways to incorporate more quinoa into our diet and this is such a tasty and easy recipe!
This is amazing! My chicken didn’t thaw in time so I improvised with chickpeas instead, turned out so good!
Delicious! Can’t wait to make again.
I just made this dish last night! AMAZING!! I am a HUGE Quinoa fan… I used my 9×13 glass dish to bake this and reading through your notes – I baked 40 minutes at 375 Degrees – uncovered it bumped the temp to 400 degrees and cooked for 25 minutes – turned out PERFECT! My husband is not a mushroom fan – so I didnt add those… But this was an awesome dish! Thank you for sharing this recipe!
I LOVEEEEE this recipe so much! Glad you guys loved it!
I make this ALL THE TIME. It’s a life saver – so easy to make and always delicious. Also perfect for work leftovers. Thanks for such a quick, easy and tasty dish! Note that I skip the mushrooms and add a red pepper instead.
I’m with you on the mushroom thing, but that’s just my personal preference! The rest of the team LOVES them.
Has anyone tried to freeze this? Or reheat it? I cooked it for a new mom and made it two days early :/
I just reheated it and it’s just as good the second time! Haven’t tried freezing/reheating it yet. We didn’t have enough leftovers for that!
What type of mushrooms do you use?
Dooooo ya think this recipe could be made in the crock-pot?
I made this for my family and everyone loved it! Love your posts and thanks for sharing!
YAY! So glad they loved it!
I don’t have a ceramic baking dish, so hopefully my pyrex will do the trick!
This was delicious! Oh my God cooking quinoa usually scares the shit out of me. Too much water in the pan and it’s snot, too little and it burns. It has such precise instructions. I do love quinoa though and it’s super healthy. 🙁 So this recipe was like finding a little diamond. It was ridiculously easy too. Thank you so much for this, I’m secretly hoping for more quinoa bake recipes in the future hehe
P. S. The crispy edges are to die for
Wow! What a great recipe. Everyone in my house loved it including my picky daughter who said she wouldn’t eat it when she first saw it. But then of course ate it all! I loved the idea of using quinoa instead of pasta. It was very light which was what I was looking for. Pasta is overrated! The only thing different I did was use a can of roasted tomatoes and cut up zucchini.
just made this for 5 people, it was quite garlic flavoured but personally i thought that complemented the other flavours, I am a 15 year old who lives a healthy lifestyle so i cook about once a week for my family, always something healthy! And this was the perfect thing for my picky family because the chicken could easily be taken to eat on its own, i loved the flavours and knowing what I’m eating is healthy makes it so much nicer. Really loved the recipe, served with some veg and finished off with some all natural greek yogurt topped with a bunch of cereals, granola and of course some apple!
Love that you’re in to cooking at such a young age <3 Glad you loved it!
I entered this recipe into myfitnesspal and got drastically different calorie numbers per serving than what is listed. If the recipe serves 6, 1 serving is 624 calories, 25.5g of fat, and 39g of carbs, and 60.4g of protein. I used 3oz chicken breasts and Newman’s Own Marinara sauce. I can’t figure out how in the world you got your numbers. Can you help clarify?
Your video says 400deg but the description says 375? ?. I’m baking mine at 375 and it seems to need some extra time but also seems waterier than the video and pics… so I’d second the person who mentioned using 2 cups of marinara instead of 3! Smells delicious though!
The video shows a drizzle of olive oil over the cheese and chicken but not your instructions. Would that have made a difference in the results? I made it without the olive oil drizzle and it was fine but cheese didn’t Brown for me.
Not sure that would have made a difference! I think it has to do with how hot your oven is or how close your casserole is to the top!