Picnic chicken salad

Today I thought I try and recreate the old picnic staple of chicken salad. I had already poached a chicken for 12 hours, which left me with a litre and a half golden bone broth and a lot of cooked meat. After that amount of simmering there was no doubt the chicken was well and truly cooked, albeit slightly bland as poached chicken generally is. It needed to be mixed with some interesting flavours to liven it up a little. Now as I couldn't bulk it out with elbow macaroni it needed some other additions. Languishing in the fridge (amongst other dubious furry green objects!) was a small, slightly wrinkled kohlrabi and a small head of broccoli. I figured I could use these along with the old faithfuls of celery, green onions and freshly made mayonnaise to make it extra tasty.

As I  am hypothyroid, I have been advised not to eat raw cruciferous vegetables as they have been shown to inhibit thyroid function due to chemicals in them called goitrogens. Cooking or steaming the vegetables destroys these chemicals, so to err on the side of caution I blanched the broccoli and kohlrabi for about a minute in boiling water and then drained them in cold to stop them cooking further. The short cooking time doesn't make them soft and of course you can leave your broccoli and kohlrabi raw if you have no thyroid issues.

This dish keeps well and even benefits from sitting overnight in the fridge to give the flavours a chance to meld together. Use a whole chicken, double the other ingredients and bring this to your next potluck and watch everyone wolf it down. Once they taste it, they won't even realise that it hasn't got the macaroni in it and even better you can eat it safe in the knowledge that it's whole 30 approved, paleo and gluten free.

Ingredients serves 4-6
1/2 of a whole cooked chicken, skin removed and chicken shredded into small pieces
4 sticks of celery finely chopped  (I prefer mine this way, if you like chunks then go for it!)
2 green/spring onions, finely chopped (use all the onion including the green part)
1 small head of broccoli cut into small pieces (and blanched for 1 minute in boiling water-optional)
1 small kohlrabi coarsely grated (and blanched for 1 minute in boiling water-optional)
1/2 red onion finely sliced
1/2 cup fresh mayo, (this is a great foolproof recipe from Sarah Fragoso, watch how easy it is to make)
fresh chives
freshly ground sea salt.

Set a pan of boiling water on the stove over high heat if you wish to blanch the broccoli and kohlrabi, (If not go ahead and use these raw). Finely chop the broccoli and coarsely grate the kohlrabi, add to the boiling water and let it cook for one minute. Strain and rinse with cold water to prevent it cooking any more and becoming soft.

 

Finely chop the celery and green onions and thinly slice the onion. Shred the cooked chicken with a fork and set aside.

Freshly poached chicken, buy a whole deli chicken if you want to save time

Mayo with fresh chives, once you taste it you'll never go back to the stuff in the jar

In a large bowl mix together the shredded chicken, the broccoli and kohlrabi, along with the celery, green onions and red onion. Add the mayo and stir well to combine. Sprinkle over some freshly chopped chives and don't be afraid to be generous with the salt. The chicken is quite bland and the salt helps to bring out all the flavours of the vegetables. If in doubt add a little salt, let it rest a while then taste again and add more if needed. Allow to rest covered with cling film in the fridge for at least 2 hours, but ideally overnight is better. Serve on lettuce leaves, spooned over salad, or do as I do and eat it greedily by the spoonful straight from the fridge!!

Garlic Chilli chicken

 We love spicy food in our house, so when I saw this recipe on the BBC Good Food website I knew it would be well received. Ideally, I would have like to have used chicken thighs, as called for in the original recipe, but strangely they are hard to come by in the supermarket at the moment. Instead I used boneless chicken breasts which were a good substitute if you are trying to cut out unnecessary fat. I also tinkered around with the spices, purely because we like things hot, adjust spices to suit your own palate.

Ingredients serves 6 (adapted from A BBC Good Food recipe)
 6 chicken breasts cut into cubes
1 large onion very finely chopped
3 green chillies finely chopped
4 garlic cloves crushed
1" piece fresh ginger, peeled and grated
2 tablespoons coconut oil
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
1 teaspoon chili powder
1 teaspoon curry powder
6 large tomatoes cut into chunks
400g fresh baby spinach leaves

Melt the coconut oil in a heavy bottomed pan over medium heat, add the chopped onion, green chillies, crushed garlic cloves and grated ginger and stir for about 5 minutes until softened. Add the cumin, turmeric, chili powder and curry powder and stir for another minute or so until it is all combined.

Add the chicken pieces and mix well with the spicy mixture in the pan so it is well coated with the onion and spice mix. Cook for 10 minutes until the chicken is no longer pink.

Add the chopped tomatoes with 1/2 cup of water, cover the pan with a lid and simmer for 20 minutes.

 Finally, add the spinach to the chicken and cook for a further 10 minutes. Taste and add a little more spice or a little salt according to taste.

 Serve with cauliflower rice  However, instead of adding peppers to the rice I gently fried 5 crushed cardamon seeds to infuse in a little oil, removed the seeds and then gently tossed the cauliflower rice in the oil to give it a light Indian flavour,

Bacon fried spinach with poached eggs

 I love eggs and could probably eat them for every meal. My absolute favourite ways to eat them are poached, soft boiled, or scrambled to a soft creamy consistency. If you are going for the first two choices, you need something to soak up the yolk because it would be criminal to waste any of that golden eggy goodness. Seeing as how my childhood favourite of egg with toast soldiers (a Great British tradition) is now but a distant memory I needed something to catch all those last drops of yolk. This is good for a Sunday brunch, serve it with a couple of slices of good bacon and you'll be good to go until teatime!

There are many schools of thought on how to make the best poached eggs. I have tried the classic chef's method of pouring them into a deep saucepan of simmering water that you swirl around just before you drop the egg into it. All it left me with, was a solitary bobbing yolk and whites that resembled egg drop soup! I found the best method that works for me, in Cooks Illustrated Magazine and it really is quite simple. Of course you can also buy nifty saucepans with poaching inserts and also microwave egg holders. I have a tiny kitchen and no room for unnecessary gadgets so I do them in the frying pan and in 99% of cases they turn out great. If you're really not in the mood to poach your eggs you can also make this with soft boiled eggs or a sunny side up fried egg, whatever floats your boat.


Ingredients Serves 2
1 small onion, peeled and thinly sliced
4 slices thick bacon chopped into small pieces.
500g bag of freshly washed spinach leaves. (you can use the equivalent weight of frozen spinach for this, just be sure to microwave it until it is no longer frozen and then squeeze out all of the excess water)
2 eggs (or more if you are feeling greedy!)

Pour about 2" of hot water into non stick skillet, add 1 tablespoon white vinegar and bring to the boil. Once it is boiling turn heat down to low/medium so it is very gently bubbling away.

While the pan of water is heating up, add the bacon and onion to a preheated non stick frying pan (Medium high heat) and cook until the bacon is just crispy and the onion is slightly browned.

Add the spinach and toss gently until just wilted. Turn down the heat and cover with a lid

 Crack the eggs into two separate cups and gently pour them into the simmering water, don't pour them from up high, keep the cup as close to the pan as you can when pouring them in. This helps to prevent the white and yolks from breaking up and this way they don't move about too much so you get a neater poached egg. The eggs should take about 2 1/2 -3 minutes to cook depending on how well done you like your yolks.

To remove eggs from the skillet, use a slotted spoon and blot off any excess water with a paper towel 

Spoon the spinach and bacon onto a plate and top with the poached egg, cut it in half to let that lovely yolk ooze into the spinach and bacon.....Enjoy!

Chilli lime chicken with avocado feta salsa

This chicken dish is really delicious, even for those who aren't keen on plain avocado (me). I found the recipe on Chowstalker which featured a blog called Peace love and low carb  Do go and look over there for some great recipe inspiration. I tinkered with it a little bit because a) I detest artichokes, which were in the original recipe b) that's just what I do, and c) I didn't read the instructions properly!

However for the most part I stayed pretty true to the original ingredients and the whole family really loved it. I cooked the chicken on the barbecue grill, but you can do them under the broiler or in a griddle pan instead. As I said, I didn't read the instructions properly and used the olive oil, garlic and lime juice as part of the rub (more of a marinade), the end results were still great though!

Ingredients (serves 6)
6 skinless, boneless, chicken breasts
Marinade
juice of 1 lime
2-3 tablespoons olive oil or melted coconut oil
1 tablespoon ground cumin
1 tablespoon chilli powder ( I used Spanish smoked paprika instead)
2 fresh garlic cloves, crushed  (or 1 tablespoon garlic powder)
1 teaspoon onion powder
1/2 teaspoon ground spicy red chili powder or 1/2 fresh red chilli finely chopped
1/4 bunch fresh cilantro/coriander finely chopped
salt and pepper

Combine all the marinade ingredients, put the chicken into a ziploc bag and pour over the marinade. Reseal the bag and let it sit in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.

Preheat the grill, while you are waiting for it to get hot, make the salsa. ( I made more salsa than was needed and used it as a side salad rather than a salsa type dressing)

Ingredients
1 large avocado skinned and roughly chopped
6 large tomatoes roughly chopped
1/4 cup capers
2 cloves garlic crushed
1/2 cup feta cheese (crumbled)
1/2 red onion finely chopped
1/2 bunch cilantro chopped
juice of a lime
olive oil to drizzle

This is just before I added the avocado

Combine all the ingredients and mix with the lime juice to prevent the avocado browning. Just before serving drizzle with a little olive oil. No salt is needed because the capers are very salty.

When the grill is nice and hot, cook the chicken pieces on both sides until cooked through. Serve with the salsa and a side salad.

Eggs on the run!

I was hoping to just sneak back in here and hope nobody noticed that I've been gone since January....... Winter bought the blahs with it, and the inclination to blog was taken over by the inclination to eat copious amounts of chocolate instead! However recent temperatures seem to indicate that spring has sprung, I have regained my blogging mojo, jumped back on the Primal eating wagon, taken tenuous steps into beginners Crossfit (ouch!) and have a large backlog of photos and recipes to post. So keep checking back because there are some really delicious ones to come!

Today's offering is for breakfast on the go. You will probably have seen these before on the internet, but the combinations of flavors and ingredients you can add are just endless, so I thought I'd make some and report back. What you DEFINITELY need is a silicon muffin tray or individual silicon cupcake cases. I tried this with a metal non stick cupcake tin and it was an epic failure!! With the silicon ones, the finished eggs slip right out, without the 30 minute scrubfest of the pan afterwards. These are great for mornings when you have an  early workout but don't want a huge breakfast beforehand, just bring a couple of these and pop them in the microwave when you get to work. These keep for up to a week in the fridge, so make them on Sunday night and breakfast worries are over for the next few days.

Ingredients makes 6
6 slices of bacon
4- 6 beaten eggs depending on size (start with 4, you can always whip up a couple more)
1 Spring (green) onion or half a small onion finely chopped
1/4 bell pepper finely chopped (whatever color you have on hand)
3 or 4 mushrooms finely chopped
1 or 2 sausages finely sliced
some fresh herbs (if you feel like it, fresh chives always go great with eggs)
small sprinkling of cheddar cheese on top (if you do dairy products)
black pepper freshly ground

Preheat oven to 190C/375F
On a microwave safe plate, cook the bacon for about 3 minutes or so, then blot with paper towels ( I tried using uncooked bacon at first, but found it made the eggs a bit greasy. You don't want it to be really crispy, but it's definitely better to start out with cooked bacon. (I've found that bacon cooked in the microwave covered with a paper towel is the best way to cook it and clean up is much easier than using the frying pan, whatever method works best for you is fine!) I suppose you can also trim off some of the fat, if you want to save time pre-cooking the bacon or even use strips of deli ham instead.

Please say you haven't seen the dust on the cases, dust is organic right?

Place the silicon muffin cases onto a baking tray (easier to do it now when they aren't full of eggs!!)
When the bacon has cooled a little, wrap it around the edge of the muffin case, it doesn't have to be perfect as the eggs and fillings, will cook into any gaps.

I know, I said to use cooked bacon, this was my first (rather greasy) attempt, either trim the fat, use pre-cooked bacon or deli ham instead

In a non stick pan fry the chopped sausage, onion, mushrooms and bell peppers (feel free to add more toppings of your own choice) until just cooked. 

Spoon into the center of the bacon wrapped cases. Sprinkle with fresh herbs and a good grinding of black pepper. Whisk the eggs together in a jug and pour over the muffin cups, fill to just over 3/4 full. Add the freshly ground black pepper and sprinkle a little cheddar on top.

 Bake for 25-35 minutes until slightly risen, lightly browned and the eggs are set. 

Allow to cool for a few minutes then gently ease them out of the muffin cases and let them cool further on a paper towel lined cooling rack. (do not take a big bite out of one when it is fresh from the oven, I still have missing skin on the roof of my mouth!!) When cool put into a tub in the fridge or into individual portions in ziplock bags. Reheat in the microwave for  about 20 seconds, you can also eat them cold, I'm strange and really like cold eggs!!

Variations are endless but try,
Well drained spinach with feta
smoked salmon, chopped spring (green) onions, and chopped dill
ham and cheese
spicy mushrooms
pepperoni and cheese with a sprinkling of oregano (kids like these 'Pizza eggs')

Spicy Barbecue sauce

So the 30 day challenge went slightly by the wayside at the weekend when a freak bread craving, resulted in an unfortunate Turkish pizza incident! Back on track now. Part of the problem arises when I don't plan out meals in advance, then I get hungry and my willpower deserts me over convenience! My goal this week was to have meals planned out (at least in my head, the night before!) I recently ordered a copy of 'Well Fed' by Melissa Joulwan. In it she describes how she plans and preps, a weeks meals in just one hour every Sunday. This appeals to me and so I'm hoping to try this at the weekend. At the very least I need to empty the freezer so even if I plan what we're having with what we've got on hand, that'll be a good start.

Today's offering is for Barbecue Sauce as I'm making pulled pork in the crock pot today. If you read the ingredients on bottles of barbecue sauce you'll see it's full of sugar and HFCS along with food additives I can't even pronounce. I turned to the website Chowstalker for inspiration. Chowstalker is chock full of recipes that adhere to the  Primal / Paleo / Whole 30 / low carb way of eating. Updated daily it is a great resource and features recipes gathered from all the major websites that offer this way of eating. I found a few recipes and using them as inspiration, cobbled together a recipe for a spicy barbecue sauce that is simple to make and will be used later for my pulled pork. There are a couple of tablespoons of Maple syrup in this recipe, if you wish you can substitute with half a fresh pineapple if you don't use honey or maple syrup as an occasional sweetener.

Ingredients (Makes Approx 500ml sauce)
4 diced tomatoes, use those wrinkly ones in the bottom of the salad drawer in the fridge!
1 large onion, roughly chopped
4 garlic cloves, roughly chopped
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 cup beef stock
2 tablespoons Dijon Mustard
2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons sweet paprika
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/4 cup natural, (no added sugar) apple juice (Naturtrub)
2 tablespoon maple syrup or honey (you can substitute this with 1/2 pineapple peeled and cut into chunks)
1 teaspoon liquid smoke
1/2 teaspoon allspice
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano

Put all ingredients together in a pan and cook over medium heat until it starts to bubble. 

Turn the heat down to low, cover with a lid and cook for a further 45 minutes.

Allow to cool a little, then blend it until smooth (but don't overfill the blender jug as I did....oops!) 

Store in the refrigerator until needed. 

French onion soup

 Last week I made some beef bone broth with the intention of making French onion soup. Making the soup itself is not difficult. It's the broth that's a little time consuming which is why I have already ordered some more bones from our meat supplier with the intention of freezing the broth for later use. I have tried to make it with stock cubes and canned broth but the depth of flavor really isn't there. Of course this would be really amazing with the floating chunks of French bread and cheese but it was still pretty filling and went pretty quickly. You'll need a mixture of onions for best results, I used yellow, red and shallots.  I guess I used about 8 or 9 medium sized onions. I also sliced them in the food processor but you can cut them thinly by hand. Most onion soup recipes call for a little sugar sprinkled over the onions to help caramelize them, you can do it without the sugar, it just takes a few minutes extra.

Ingredients Serves 6-8
A mixture of 8-10 onions (e.g red, yellow, shallot- medium to large in size, thinly sliced)
 cloves garlic crushed
1 tablespoon coconut oil
3 tablespoons ghee
2 litres of beef bone broth
salt and pepper
2 tablespoons cognac (optional)

 Place a heavy bottomed Dutch oven or pan on high heat and melt the ghee and coconut oil.

Add the onions to the pan and keep stirring them until the edges of them start to turn dark, this takes about 5 minutes or so. Then turn the heat down to the lowest setting, add the crushed garlic, stir once and then cook the onions and garlic, uncovered for a further 20-25 minutes without stirring. The bottom of the pan by this time, will be covered in a brown caramelized layer.

  Pour over the beef broth and season well with plenty of salt and pepper, scraping the bottom of the pan with a wooden spoon to release all the caramelized onion flavors.

Bring it up to simmering point and then turn it down to the lowest setting and leave it to cook uncovered for at least an hour. Just before serving check for seasonings and add the cognac (if using) for a little extra warmth.

Serve piping hot.

Garlic & spinach cauliflower rice.

 

This is based on a Turkish recipe that I ate once, which calls for brown rice cooked with onions, garlic and spinach  and finished with a big knob of butter. This is another way of making it using 'cauliflower rice' It still tasted very good though and went well with the chicken curry. The best part is if you have a food processor it's really fast to make.

Ingredients serves 4-6
1 large cauliflower, leaves cut off and broken up into florets
ghee or coconut oil
1 large onion cut into slices
2 cloves garlic finely chopped
1 250g bag of roughly chopped fresh spinach ( I used frozen because it was more convenient, either is fine)
salt to taste.

First, place the cauliflower pieces in a food processor and pulse until it resembles little grains of rice. Set aside for a minute.

Heat a wok or deep pan over medium heat and add about 1-2 tablespoons ghee or coconut oil, gently fry the onions and garlic for about 10 minutes until they are soft but not browned.

Add the spinach and toss until it is wilted (or melted if using frozen.) 

Turn up the heat to medium high, then add the cauliflower 'rice' to the pan and toss together with the spinach and onions until it is both hot and tender, this only takes a few minutes. I often  add a splash of water to the pan which helps to steam the cauliflower and cook a little faster, (by a splash I mean no more than 1 tablespoon of water, any more and you will get soggy 'rice' unless you cook off the all the water)

Add plenty of salt to taste and serve immediately.

Chicken curry

So it's glaringly obvious that I am a useless resolution maker. My promise of posting on a daily basis fell spectacularly by the wayside. We are still mostly adhering to the 30 day challenge, however it quickly became evident that I am an evil despot without my morning cup of tea and after 13 days, the husband made me a cup of tea and insisted I drink it because I was making everyone's life unbearable!! I am still trying to limit my intake to a max of two cups a day and I drink it with coconut milk so it's not all bad. Matters haven't been helped by the husband undergoing major dental reconstruction work, which has meant for the last week he can only eat soup, pureed food, scrambled eggs or whatever he can chew like a rabbit through his front teeth!! It has made meal planning somewhat difficult, after all there are only so many ways you can make mashed cauliflower!!

One of the dishes I made this week was a chicken and vegetable curry. I did use curry paste from a jar but a quick scan of the ingredients revealed nothing sinister, just oil, chili, garlic and ground spices. The instructions say to use yogurt but I've always added a can of coconut milk instead and it complements the heat of the curry quite well. I always make a large pot so there is plenty for leftovers and it freezes really well too.

Ingredients Serves 6-8
8 skinless chicken breasts chopped into 1"cubes
a little coconut oil for frying
1 tablespoon of Indian curry powder
1 onion roughly chopped
1 red yellow and green pepper chopped into 1" chunks
1 small sweet potato peeled and cut into 1" chunks
2 carrots cut into chunks
5-6 heaped tablespoons of Indian curry paste ( this equates to about 1/2 a jar, if you want extra heat buy a curry paste labeled hot or extra hot such as Vindaloo or Jalfrezi, for a milder curry use a milder paste like Korma or Tikka Masala.
1, 14 oz can coconut milk
1, 14 oz can tomato sauce
Fresh cilantro/coriander finely chopped

Heat a heavy bottomed pan over medium high heat, add the coconut oil, the chopped onion and the curry powder and fry for 2-3 minutes until the curry powder has infused flavor into the onion.

 

Add the cubed chicken to the onion and fry for 8-10 minutes until the chicken is no longer pink.

Then add all the remaining vegetables and stir well. In a separate bowl, gently whisk the curry paste with the can of coconut milk so it is well combined, add this to the chicken and vegetables along with the can of tomato sauce.

Turn down the heat to medium/low and cook for about 45 mins to an hour, until the vegetables are cooked through. Sprinkle with the finely chopped coriander/cilantro and serve with cauliflower rice.

this is the brand of curry paste that I use. For those of us who live overseas, it is not too hard to find in most Indian/Asian shops.