Once You've Gone Asian...(Thai Chicken Skewers and Broccoli Slaw)

Thai Chicken Skewers

I've spoke before about cooking what you love, and loving what you cook.  I truly believe that you cook best what you love to eat best.  I happen to love Asian food.  Not really traditional Asian food--my stomach gets nauseous just thinking of Chinese take-out--but I love Asian-fusion dishes, and my culinary credo just keeps going up by adding Asian-inspired dishes to the menu.

If you haven't yet tried one of my dishes but love healthy Asian dishes, please consider giving these (as well as the recipes I'm about to share) a whirl:

• Cold Asian Noodles
• Amber's Spicy Asian Noodles
• Coconut Lemongrass Rice
• Asian Salmon with Wasabi Mashed Potatoes and Sesame Green Beans

So...these recipes rock.  However, there's a new Asian-fusion recipe to add to your reportrois.  I found it while digging through a stack of torn magazine pages that I had cut out and saved in hopes of giving them a try "one day."

I was hosting Elf Bowling night, and I needed an easy way to feed a ton of people with a recipe that was as far away from the holiday classics as possible.  Here's the menu I came up with.  Call it Asian Persuasion but...now I'll never go back.

Thai Chicken Skewers with Lemongrass

Thai Chicken with Lemongrass

Ingredients:

2TBSP Fish Sauce
3TBSP Soy Sauce, divided
1TBSP Brown Sugar (or lighten it up with Splenda)
1TBSP Minced Garlic
1TBSP Lemongrass (if using dry, soften in a bowl of water for a half hour first)
2 Green Onions, in 1/2" pieces 
2Lbs Boneless Skinless Chicken Breasts (cut into large 2" pieces)
2TBSP Rice Vinegar
1/4C Vegetable Oil
2TBSP Ginger
1TBSP Garlic Chili Sauce (less if you don't like spicy)

Instructions:

Combine fish sauce, 2TBSP soy sauce, sugar, garlic, lemongrass, green onions, and chicken in a bowl. Toss to coat and let marinate 30mins to 6 hours.

Whisk remaining soy sauce, rice vinegar, oil, ginger, and chili sauce together.

Remove chicken from marinade and skewer using grill-save skewers. Grill chicken on the BBQ, bashing it as it cooks using the soy sauce/vinegar mixture.

Serve with Coconut Lemongrass Rice (follow link for recipe).

Citrus Broccoli Slaw

Ingredients:

2TBSP Sugar or Splenda

Thai Broccoli Slaw

1/3C Rice Vinegar
1/3C Olive Oil
1 12oz Can of Mandarin Oranges
1-2C of Shredded Carrots
1-2C Broccoli (cut into slivers)
2 Green Onions (sliced into 1/2" pieces)
1C Cabbage (optional)
1/4C Cilantro (fresh)
Salt and Pepper

Instructions:

In a mason jar, combine sugar, vinegar, olive oil, salt and pepper.  Shake to mix.

In a large bowl, add oranges, carrots, broccoli, onions, and cabbage.  Pour dressing over top and mix well.  Top with cilantro.  Add salt and pepper to taste. 

PF Chang's-Style Lettuce Wraps

Lettuce Wraps (like PF Changs) (follow link for recipe).

Quick Coconut Lemongrass Rice

Coconut Lemongrass Rice

As previously discussed, I LIVE for Asian food!  So, I'm always looking for a way to add a little Asian fusion to my favorite foods. 

My latest experiment?  I replaced the water in my rice cooker with coconut water.  It was amazing!

To do this yourself, pair raw jasmine rice with coconut water (I live at high elevation, so I do one cup of rice to 1-1/4 cups of coconut water) and lemongrass. 

Cook as usual, and then pan fry with scallions, salt and pepper.  Then I topped with some edible violas from my garden and some lime for added flavor.  YUM!

Lemongrass is very easy to grow and smells amazing.  Plant it by seed in the Spring, and harvest when the shoots get about as large as a green onion.  Pull from the root and shuck off the grassy exterior until you have nothing but the soft white reed core showing. This is the edible part.  Soak or boil in water to soften before using.

This coconut lemongrass rice is delicious with a twist of lime!

Roasted Coconut Lime Chicken that is to Thai-For!

Thai Roasted Chicken

Oh my God do I love the following: Thai food, lime, cilantro, chicken, coconut. So, when I found this recipe in Martha Stewart's Food Magazine, I had to try it because it contained all my favorites.

Now, first a confession.  I really, really don't want to like Martha Stewart.  In general, when I watch her show, I find her kind of unfriendly, a bit rude and brash with her guests, and her whole show and image seems a bit staged.  But, what I can't deny is this: as a publisher, she has an immaculate magazine that's filled with beautiful photography, great ideas, and not once has one of her recipes failed me.  Therefore, how can I fault her for that? 

I'm so sick of rushing out collecting ingredients for a recipe only to find the recipe lacks direction, taste, or simplicity.  I think many of these home magazines publish recipes without ever trying them.  Let me tell you, I would never do that to you!  If I publish something, it's because it's worth making again.  Hence, there are some weeks that I post no recipes.  That means it was a bad week of cooking at my house.  Other weeks, I've got recipes galore.

This recipe is no different.  Please try it!  It's simple, cheap, and one of the best chicken recipes I've ever made!

Roasted Coconut Lime Thai Chicken

Effort Meter (1 to 5): 2

Delicious Meter (1 to 5): 5
 
Serving Suggestion: Serve with plain jasmine rice (you can mix 1/2 jasmine with 1/2 brown rice for extra fiber), and a bed of raw Thai vegetables such as shredded carrots, green onions, white onions, cilantro, lime, and nuts.  I took the rice, topped with my veggies and squeezed lime and salt over the top, then topped with my chicken.  DELICIOUS!

Weight Watcher POINTS - About 6 points per leg, plus the rice is 3 points for 1/4C.


Ingredients:

One family-size package of bone-in, skin-on, chicken legs (or you can opt for another cut, or an entire chicken, just make sure it's of the skin-on variety...that's what holds in the juices).  These are extremely cheap, about $5.50 for a 10-pack.

2TBSP lime zest plus 1/4C lime juice (from two limes)

2TBSP ground ginger

4 cloves of minced garlic

2 TBSP of brown sugar

Salt (to taste)

1 can of coconut milk

Cooked jasmine rice, shredded carrots, chopped nuts, cilantro, onion, and lime (for serving suggestion)

Instructions:

In a large casserole pan or lasagna pan, combine lime, ginger, garlic, sugar, and about 1-1/2TSP of salt.  

Whisk in coconut milk.

Add chicken and toss in marinade.  Cover and refrigerate for 4 - 12 hours. 

Preheat oven to 475.  Cover a rimmed baking sheet or lasagna pan with foil.  Remove chicken from marinade and shake excess, then arrange on baking sheet, skin side up.  Roast about 30 - 35 minutes.  

Serve over bed of rice and vegetables.

 

Related articles

• The Suprisingly Sophisticated Chicken Curry Casserole Bake with Broccoli
• Mardi Gras Jambalaya: Easier to Make than To Spell!
• A Kind of White Trash Weight Watchers Recipe