Thursday 11 February 2016

Healthy Chinese Salt and Pepper chicken






Hi there everyone,

It's been a while I know,
and I'm hoping to gain your forgiveness by posting this scrummy recipe for Salt and Pepper Chicken.

I've been trying to get my head in the right place, to get me back on track with trying to lose some weight. At the start of last week, it finally clicked, and I have been eating healthily since then, which is just coming up two weeks since I started.
Now the whole house is on the weight-loss wagon.
As a mum, of two, and the wife of a very hungry man, I sometimes struggle to come up with healthy, hearty meals, that suit us all, seeing as my husband is almost like having an extra child, and a fussy one at that.
He gets bored really easily, and soon loses interest in trying to lose weight, so my efforts this time, to help keep him on the wagon, have had to increase.
He has two main weaknesses with food. The first is gravy, he likes it thick, and he likes it in great quantities!
And the second, is Chinese food. He has a food love affair with salt and pepper chips, and salt and pepper chicken.

so the latter will be the main body for this post, with another, for another day, and will deal with his gravy needs.

I'd heard people talking about using instant potato flakes as a kind of breadcrumb coating, and pulled a face, as I couldn't see how it could possibly work, and thought it would just turn to potato flavoured mush.

I was sooo wrong. My first attempts started as a popular slimming word recipe, for KFC style chicken. I adapted this, and made homemade, chicken nuggets, and they were LUSH! they went down a storm, and I, for once had clean plates, with a chorus of requests, asking when I could make it again.

the instant mash, was an instant smash!

I then started to try and think out of the box, and how I could keep my husband interested in his diet, but so he could have what he fancied, and so came up with the idea of doing Salt and Pepper chicken.

It too was a roaring success, so I thought I would share my recipe with you all.

Here's how to make it.






THINGS YOU'LL NEED:

~1/2 cup instant potato flakes
a pinch of chilli powder
~1/4 tsp garlic salt
~1/4 tsp celery salt
~~a good pinch of pepper
2 chicken stock cubes, the bouillon kind
3 cloves of garlic
1 de-seeded fresh red chilli
4 good sized skinless,
chicken breasts,
with all visible fat removed.
1 thinly sliced onion.
fry light
1/2 cup of boiling water


Method

Preheat your oven to 190degrees Celsius/ 375 degrees



Fahrenheit/gas mark 5~in a clean shallow container, add 1/2 a cup of instant mashed potato flakes. add all the herbs and spices and mix well.

add the two stock cubes to the boiling water, and mix well, to create a loose paste.

 prepare the chicken, by trimming it of any visible fat, and cut it into roughly one inch chunks.

spray a baking sheet with the fry light and set up a little production line of the paste mix, the seasoned flakes, the chicken and the baking sheet.

dip the chicken into the stock paste,


then roll in the instant potato flakes mix, and then place on the tray, carry on this process until all the chicken has been coated, and spaced evenly
on the tray.


Then pop in the oven for 20-25 minutes, and cook until piping hot all the way through, and golden brown.



While the chicken cooks, chop up the chilli and the garlic, then chop up the onion.






Once the chicken is cooked, heat a frying pan, and spray it with frylight.



throw in the onion, chili and garlic, and stir-fry until the onion just starts to soften.

add in the chicken, and stir-fry for a few minutes longer, to make sure the chicken has been well coated with the onion, chilli and garlic. try a piece to test the seasoning, and add extra salt and pepper should you wish.






then serve it up for a Syn Free version of this takeaway classic

This recipe is a tweak in the eyes of Slimming World, but they say it is down to personal choice. I class it as syn free, as I deduct the potato ratio of my meal to balance out what has been used for the coating, and this 1/2 cup amount is plenty for 4 portions.



and that's it, simple salt and pepper chicken








Here's the YouTube video accompaniment for this post





Disclaimer: Please be mindful though, if you do decide to tweak, and remember that if your weight-loss slows right down, or stops, tweaks should be the first thing that you revive and take out of your meal.

If you would like to try this recipe, but don't want to tweak, then you can always use breadcrumbs from your healthy b choice, using wholemeal bread crumbs. Failing that, eave off the coating if you are at all worried. It will still taste great


 Meals like this are now helping me and my husband on our weight-loss journey, as he still feels like he's had a real treat.

until next time...

XOXO




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