Creamy Sun-Dried Tomato Chicken Thighs

The following sauce reminds me of something that would top a pasta dish from my pre-primal days; that’s actually what Jacky, the cook who inspired this recipe, used it for.  But pasta is a “no-go” over here… so instead I used it to top chicken thighs. 😉

Thai Chicken

I got inspired to try this recipe by Malou Prestado’s blog post on her version of crispy fried chicken.  Before Malou fried her chicken she marinated it in fish sauce, lemon juice, and garlic for a couple of hours.  I’ve had an entire jar of it in my pantry for the past 4 months and no idea what to do with it… I never thought to use it as a marinade.  I then went onto A Taste of Thai’s website where I found another marinade recipe made with fish sauce and ultimately came up with the following.

Thai Chicken
Ingredients:

• 4 large chicken thighs
• ½ cup fish sauce
• Juice from 2 limes
• 1 tablespoon coconut palm sugar
• 1 tablespoon jalapeno hot sauce
• 3 cloves garlic, diced
• 2-3 tablespoons coconut oil

In a small blender, I used my roommate’s Magic Bullet, combine the fish sauce, lime juice, palm sugar, jalapeno hot sauce, and garlic until they are well mixed.  Put your chicken into a large bowl and pour the fish sauce marinade over it.  Cover the bowl of chicken with a lid or saran wrap and let it marinade in the refrigerator for any amount of time between 2 hours and 2 days.  I let mine marinade for about 26 hours.

Once you are ready to cook your chicken, heat up the coconut oil on a skillet over medium heat.  When the oil is hot, add the chicken thighs to the skillet and cook for 4 minutes on each side.  Then add a little of your fish sauce mixture to the pan, reduce the heat to medium low, and let the chicken simmer until it is completely cooked through.

Enjoy! 🙂

Spicy Shredded Chicken

This weekend I found myself having to feed some unexpected weekend guests.  Luckily I had a refrigerator full of chicken and a pantry full of seasonings.  A great blog called EZ Primal gave me the inspiration for this recipe.  I just made a couple modifications to accommodate the ingredients I already had.

Spicy Shredded Chicken:
Ingredients:

• 2 Tbsp Coconut Oil
• 1 package of Chicken Tenderloins
• 3-4 Tbsp Taco Mix Seasoning
• 1 Tbsp Ground Cumin
• salt and pepper to taste
• ½ cup Chicken Broth (I used the low-sodium kind from Trader Joe’s)

Heat the Coconut Oil over medium heat in a large pan.  While the oil is heating, season your chicken with the taco mix seasoning, cumin, salt, and pepper.  When the oil is hot, cook your chicken for a few minutes on each side or until it is cooked through.  Next add the chicken broth, lower the heat to a simmer, and continue cooking until the broth has cooked off.  This should take about 5 minutes.  Then shred your chicken using two forks and enjoy 🙂

Cook’s Oven-Baked Drumsticks – “Primalfied”

Primalfy: to make something non-primal… primal.

Earlier this week I decided to primalfy a chicken recipe from Cook’s Illustrated.  Cook’s Illustrated is one of my favorite cooking magazines.  They offer so many fabulous recipes that have been tested and tweaked to perfection…along with scientific explanations and detailed descriptions of the methods to make them.  Unfortunately these recipes are often not primal-friendly… hence the need to primalfy them.

The original recipe from Cook’s Illustrated was for Baked Drumsticks and called for all-purpose flour (evil), butter (not quite evil… but I avoid dairy), and garlic powder (I was all out).  What’s a girl to do?

I swapped the all-purpose flour for almond meal, the butter for coconut oil, and the garlic powder for onion powder and the results… were amazing. 

Cook’s Baked Drumsticks  – “Primalfied”

• ½ cup almond meal
• 1 tsp salt
• ¼ tsp onion powder
• ½ tsp paprika
• ¼ tsp pepper
• 6 chicken drumsticks
• ¼ cup coconut oil, melted

Heat oven to 425 degrees.

Mix almond meal, salt, onion powder, paprika, and pepper in a bowl.  In a separate bowl: pour coconut oil over drumsticks and make sure each one is well coated.  Then roll the chicken drumsticks in the almond meal mixture until they are well coated.  Arrange in an ungreased pan and bake for 50 minutes.

Red Pepper Chicken “Nuggets”

Who doesn’t love chicken nuggets?  I used to frequent McDonalds for their “Chicken Selects” quite frequently.  Unfortunately those chicken selects are filled with all sorts of scary ingredients including: Dimethylpolysiloxane (an anti-foaming agent)… how delicious!  Fortunatelyusing my food processor I was able to make my own dimethylpolysiloxane-free, homemade version of chicken nuggets… and I tossed some red pepper in there just to keep things interesting and flavorful.

Red Pepper Chicken “Nuggets”:
Ingredients:

• 1 large chicken breast
• 1 egg
• ¾ cup almond meal (divided into 2 parts: ¼ cup & ½ cup)
• ½ red pepper
• ¼ red onion
• 2 tablespoons coconut oil

Combine chicken, egg, ¼ cup almond meal, red pepper, and onion in a food processor until it is well-blended.

Spread ½ cup almond meal onto a large plate

Form chicken mixture into a “nugget” and roll the nugget in the almond meal until the top layer is well coated.  (I made about 12 balls, or “nuggets” in total)

Heat the coconut oil in a pan over medium heat

Add the balls to the pan, turning every few minutes until they are cooked through

Enjoy!