Chicken Stir Fry (recipe)

We love vegetables. In fact, we love tons of vegetables. This stir fry nearly fell out of the wok it was so loaded with lovely vegetables. This is what we made tonight using the Coconut Aminos version of no-soy sauce.

1-1/2 - 2 pounds of chicken breast sliced into strips

2-4 tablespoons coconut aminos

2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice

4 tablespoons cooking oil

2 teaspoons fresh minced ginger

1/2 teaspoon sesame oil

1/2 teaspoon fresh ground pepper

3-4 tablespoons fish sauce (anchovies water and salt, primarily)

2 red bells peppers sliced

2 green bell peppers sliced

1 or 2 shitake mushrooms sliced

2 small zucchini very thinly sliced

1 8 ounce can of bamboo shoots strained

1 8 ounce can of water chestnuts strained

Place coconut aminos and lemon juice in with sliced raw chicken and cover and refrigerate for an hour or more to marinate. Use a wok. When the chicken is marinated, heat cooking oil over medium high heat, and sauté the ginger just until soft and then throw in the chicken over higher heat with its marinade sauce. Keep it moving, it cooks quickly! Cook for only 3-5 minutes, then put in the fish sauce, the pepper, and the sesame oil. Stir for another 30 seconds then add all the vegetables and stir fry for another 3 or 4 minutes until vegetables are still crispy but infused with the sauce. Remove from heat.

Serve with Jasmine rice for a great low sulfur Chinese stir fry dish.

Namaste,

~Miriam

Raspberry Glazed Chicken a la Lisa

Ah, a recipe I don't need to test out, because my friend, Lisa Prague, invented it and I know what a great cook she is already. :)

I maybe post some of her other recipes, but you might want to wander through her GF blog all on your own, and make replacements to her great recipes to add some lovely delish to your repertoire.

Raspberry Glazed Chicken (by Lisa Prague)

I must try this now, soon as my raspberries come into season. Yum!

Cheers!
~Miriam

Honey Dijon Mustard Chicken

We do eat a lot of chicken in this house, but since fish is so often tainted with mercury and red meat isn't something we want to have very often, we end up eating lots of fowl, and a bit of pork. This recipe could be adapted easily for any fowl, but there's just something about honey mustard chicken that works. This is a really simple recipe, prepped in a flash, and done in an hour with little effort.

A note about mustard! You will notice that most store bought dijon mustard - even the organic stuff - has an ingredient list something along the lines of: "Mustard seed, vinegar, water, salt, spices." The problem with "spices" is you don't know what they are. Are they garlic? Are they turmeric? Are they onions? So, please be careful and make sure you get a brand that doesn't say "spices", but that says what the spices specifically are. For example Annie's makes a great brand of organic dijon mustard. Note the regular Annie's mustard *does* contain cumin. The dijon, however, does not. It's important to notice stuff like "spices" on an ingredient list and to find something that is more specific, so you're not giving yourself an unwarranted load of coriander or turmeric. Deli brands like this one are a bit more expensive, but also tend to be much purer and specify ingredients.

Preheat oven to 400 F for dark meat, 350 F for white meat.

3 lbs boneless chicken pieces
1/2 Cup dijon mustard (see above note)
1/4 Cup organic raw honey
1 Tablespoon apple cider vinegar (or white wine vinegar will work if you tolerate it)
1 Tablespoon olive oil
1 teaspoon salt

Lightly oil a 9x13" glass baking pan. Place chicken pieces (we use thighs a lot because dark meat supports the sulfur pathways) in the prepared dish and set aside to prepare sauce. Whisk together dijon mustard, honey, vinegar and salt until well mixed. Slowly drizzle in the olive while whisking quickly to emulsify the oil into the sauce. Then pour the sauce over the chicken and turn the chicken over to coat both sides. Cover the dish with foil and place it in the oven for 20 minutes. After 20 minutes, remove the foil and again turn the chicken over. Allow the chicken to cook for another 40 minutes, or until done. Let it sit for 5 minutes out of the oven before serving.

This dish is wonderful with baked sweet potatoes, which you can place in the same oven as the meat about 20 minutes in (unless you have really big potatoes, then start them at the same time as the chicken) and cook until done. Make sure you poke holes in the skins of your potatoes before you cook them. Serve on a thick bed of romaine lettuce, and the mustard sauce will make a lovely dressing.

Cheers!
~Miriam

© 2012, Miriam Mason

Baked Apricot Chicken

My simple basic recipe.

Preheat oven to 375 F.

2-3 lbs chicken thighs and legs

(You can use breasts, but dark meat supports the sulfur pathways and is actually better for high cysteine folks. White meat is fine if you can't stand dark. Just adjust down 1) temp to 350 F and 2) cooking time by 5-10 minutes. You can cut into a piece to see if it's cooked the whole way through. Don't let white meat cook too long or it will dry out.)

Wash chicken pieces and place them skin-side up into a 9x13" glass baking dish.

Whisk together sauce:

1 C apricot jam
1-2 t salt (to taste)
1/4 C balsamic vinegar
1/4 C olive oil
1 t Worcestershire sauce
Pepper to taste

Pour sauce over chicken, cover with foil and place in preheated oven for about 20 minutes. Then remove cover and allow to bake until fully done, for dark meat, about an hour, for light, maybe 50-55 minutes. Baste it if you like. We prefer to let our skins get crunchy by not basting too late in the baking process.

Serve on a bed of organic romaine lettuce with baked sweet potato. The apricot sauce will end up dressing the lettuce leaves, too.

Cheers!
~~Miriam

Best Chicken Soup for Colds/Flu EVER (Link/adjustments)

Best Chicken Soup for Colds and Flu Recipe

Adjusting this amazing hot and spicey soup for low sulfur is super easy.

Simply do NOT add:

• the onions
• the cumin
• the cilantro, or
• the scallions
  

Otherwise, you can use this recipe with great abandon and add mushrooms, zucchini, potatoes, extra jalapeños or whatever, and (as we do) replace the white pasta with just-cooked brown rice to give it more nutritional punch.

I swear by this soup, it is truly medicine, especially if you're using free-range meat and organic veggies and grains.

And it's fine and dandy right through a round. It's fast turning into one of my comfort foods!

Cheers!
~Miriam

Clay Pot Thai-ish Sunflower Seed Chicken

This one is an original I did on a night I was utterly desperate for restaurant-style hot Thai peanut butter chicken. It came out so much better than I'd hoped that we've been doing this one a few times a month at least.

Use a clay pot with a lid for this, if possible. Soak the clay pot in filtered water for 20-30 minutes first. You won't preheat the oven, the clay pot must go into a cold oven or it will crack. The water seeps into the pot and makes the chicken delicate and moist.

If you use a regular iron pot, make certain you adjust for preheating time. I would suggest preheating in this case to 350-365 F (depending on your oven). I imagine a regular pot will be equally tasty.

While your clay pot is soaking, whisk the sauce together in a bowl:

1-1/4 C sunflower seed butter
1 T sesame seed oil
1/4 C rice vinegar (or white)
1 T dry sherry (optional, NOT necessary)
1-2 teaspoons sea salt or to taste
1 t. ground ginger (or an inch of finely chopped fresh)
1/4-2 t. of dried red pepper flakes (depending on how much you like your Thai to bite back, I like it HOT)
1-1/2 Cups chicken stock

When your pot is done soaking take

2.5-3 lbs skinless/boneless chicken pieces (I like thighs)

place the chicken in the soaked pot, and poor the sauce over it. Turn the chicken over in the sauce to make sure everything is well coated. Cover the Clay pot and place it in a cold oven. Set the oven to 350. If you're using red chicken meat, time is usually an hour and 10 minutes. For white meat, time is 50-60 minutes. Check the meat by cutting into a middle piece to make sure it's done. Clay pots are very good at not drying out chicken if it needs to go longer.

For a regular pot, cover and place it in a preheated oven and allow to cook until meat is done, probably 45 minutes to an hour or so, depending on what type of chicken meat.

We serve ours over brown rice or red quinoa, and sauteed mushrooms on a bed of lettuce.

Japanese Cucumber Salad would make a super nice side.

Cheers!
~Miriam

© 2012, Miriam Mason