Tag Archives: chicken

Chicken and Sausage Jambalaya

This past weekend, we got our first snow of the season in the Philadelphia area. Yes, you read that right…snow! There is something strange about looking out the window and seeing snow in the foreground and vibrant orange and yellow leaves still on the trees in the background. The sound of the chilly wind and sharp ice particles hitting my window prompted me to reach for a one pot dish like Chicken and Sausage Jambalaya. I made this recipe early on Saturday morning while it was still slightly dark out and my house smelled like warm comfort food all morning long. Smoked sausage is cooked with onion, green pepper, and celery before being simmered with long-grain rice, chicken broth and thyme. Once the rice is cooked and the liquid is absorbed, diced tomatoes, cayenne pepper, and cooked chicken are added. I used smoked turkey sausage with pepper jack cheese in this dish which added another level of heat with the cayenne pepper and was very tasty. I also used precooked chicken which has become one of my favorite time savers. I grabbed a warm bowl of this and ate it while I cozied up on the couch with a blanket and watched the unseasonal slushy snow fall. Hopefully you’ll try this too, only without the snow!

The ingredients:

Cook chopped sausage in canola oil until browned.

Add in celery, onion, green pepper, and garlic.

Once vegetables are tender, add in rice, water, broth, cayenne, salt, and thyme sprigs. Bring to a boil and let simmer for 20 minutes until rice is cooked.

When rice is cooked and all the liquid is absorbed, remove the thyme springs and stir in cooked chicken and undrained diced tomatoes. Cook a few minutes more until chicken and tomatoes are warm.

Additions: None

Omissions: None

Substitutions:

Smoked turkey sausage
Precooked chicken strips

Overall Rating: Love It

Source: Cooking Light Magazine

Latin Baked Chicken

Here is a simple recipe for chicken that only has five ingredients: Latin Baked Chicken. A short marinade of lime juice, honey, soy sauce, and chipotle chiles in adobo sauce, a quick trip to the oven and you’ve got dinner. If you’ve never had chipotle chiles in adobo sauce, they are nothing more than smoked jalapeno peppers. These little firecrackers are deliciously smoky in flavor and very spicy. The lime juice and honey in this marinade cuts the heat of the peppers slightly but if you don’t like spicy food, you probably won’t like this. I used skinless, boneless chicken breasts instead of bone-in-chicken thighs and used a meat thermometer to tell me when they were done (165°F!). I served this with a side of spanish rice (Uncle Ben’s Ready Rice Spanish Style to be exact!) as per Cooking Light’s suggestion and had a smokin’ hot dinner!

The ingredients:

Combine lime juice, soy sauce, honey, and chiles in a large bowl.

Add chicken to the marinade, coating well, and let stand for 10 minutes.

Place chicken on a baking sheet and bake in a 400°F oven. Reserve marinade.

Meanwhile, place reserved marinade in a blender and blend until smooth. Pour marinade into a small saucepan and bring to a boil.

Base chicken with marinade half-way through the baking process. Pull chicken out once it reaches 165°F, approximately 15 minutes.

Additions: None

Omissions: None

Substitutions:

Chicken breasts for chicken thighs

Overall Rating: Like It

Source: Cooking Light Magazine

Sesame Chicken Stir-Fry

I’m a sucker for stir-fry so this Sesame Chicken Stir-Fry was a no-brainer. The original recipe from Cooking Light is actually a beef stir-fry but since I don’t eat beef, I adapted it to my liking and boy, do I like it! Thin slices of chicken are cooked and then mixed with a salty, sweet, spicy sauce and then with baby spinach. Yum! If you are watching your carbs, or even if you aren’t, please consider making this. You could easily serve it over rice to make it an even heartier meal but I like it just the way it is. The stir-fry sauce is very tasty with ginger, garlic, soy sauce, brown sugar, and crushed red pepper. Because crushed red pepper doesn’t give me the kick of heat that I usually want, next time I make this (and there will be a next time!) I’ll probably substitute it with hot chili sauce like sriracha or cayenne pepper but if you have a sensitive tongue, you can leave it out altogether. If you don’t like spinach, the versatility of this recipe allows you to switch up the ingredients. Try making it with broccoli, or if you want it make it vegetarian, try this sauce with any of your favorite veggie combinations.