main-meals

Fragrant Thai Chicken Stew

April 24

This is very similar to a Thai green curry but it’s a lot lighter in terms of spices, sticking mainly with the fresh ingredients like ginger and lemongrass. I use Kaffir lime leaves here, which some supermarkets carry in the herb section, Asian markets are also bound to have them. Improvise with finely grated zest of lime. If you haven’t used lemongrass before it’s a fantastic little ingredient which is responsible for giving this dish that wonderful light and fragrant flavour. To prepare, slice off the woody ends and the root, you should be left with about 2-3 inches. If you don’t have a hand blender, just chop the paste ingredients until they’re as fine as you can get them.

Serves 4
45 mins

Method

1. In small hand blender blitz the ginger, lime leaves, garlic, red chilli and lemon grass until finely chopped. H
2. Heat a frying pan over a high heat and add a little sunflower oil. Season the chicken pieces and brown off in the pan until you have a nice golden colour on either side. Remove the chicken pieces from the pan and place on plate with some kitchen paper.
3. Pour the remaining oil and scrape any crispy bits into a medium sized high sided pot and place over a medium high heat. Add in the blitzed ingredients and stir-fry for 2-3 minutes until the they release lots of great fragrant smells! Add the chicken back in along with the coconut milk and fish sauce.
4. Cook over a gentle heat for 10 minutes until the sauce has reduced a little and the chicken is thoroughly cooked through.
5. While the chicken is bubbling away, get the rice on. Rice can get people a little panicked but the easiest way to think about it is that it is 1 part rice to 2 parts cold water. What I do is measure the rice in a glass and then use the glass to pour in the water, that way it’s easy to see the volume you need to add.
6. Add the rice and water to a pot, cover with a lid and simmer over a medium heat for about 15 minutes or according to the instructions on the packet. Serve the chicken over the rice and give a generous sprinkle of spring onions and coriander.

240g of basmati rice

8 chicken thighs, boneless and skinned, sliced in half

1 tbsp of sunflower oil

A good grind of black pepper

3 large thumb sized pieces of ginger, peeled and roughly sliced

A small handful of kaffir lime leaves, or zest of 2 limes

3 garlic cloves

1 red chilli, deseeded

3 stalks of lemongrass

1 x 400g tin of coconut milk

2 tbsp of fish sauce

A large handful of coriander, roughly chopped

6 spring onions, finely sliced

You'll Need

Hand blender

Medium sized pot

If you liked this

I love fried rice and you can really pump it up with healthy vegetables when you make it at home. The dish works best when using cooked rice from cold, so it’s an ideal time to use up your leftovers instead of cooking rice from fresh. However, cold cooked rice does tend to clump together, so place it in a large bowl, drizzle with a little oil and break it up with a fork before using.

main-meals
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Simple & Quick Pad Thai

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Rice noodles are a fantastic storecupboard ingredient and I regularly stock up at Asian markets where you can also buy jumbo sized bottles of Asian staples like fish sauce, soy sauce, and so much more. This dish is possibly one of the most famous Thai dishes and appears on menus throughout the world. Rightfully so, its a speedy dish full of deep layers of sweet and aromatic flavors.

light-meals
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Crunchy Cucumber Spiralizer Salad

February 14

I have a confession to make- I am a kitchen gadget addict and worse than that I buy other people kitchen gadgets that I secretly want for myself! A perfect example of this is the spiralizer I bought my mom for Christmas which has now made its way into my kitchen! It’s a fun little gadget which turns vegetables into interesting shapes & textures. I recently used it to make a really fresh cucumber carrot and mint salad with toasted peanuts and a sweet and spicy dressing. If you don’t have a spiralizer you can just as easily make this salad by slicing the vegetables thinly.

main-meals