Showing posts with label summer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label summer. Show all posts

Tuesday, May 27, 2014

Grilled Coconut Lime Chicken Salad with Quinoa and Tropical Fruit

This recipe was a real experiment. I took parts of different recipes and adapted them to what I envisioned.
Thomas had requested a salad with pineapple (and cantaloupe... but that part will have to wait!). Lime coconut chicken sounded like a good complement for pineapple. I hoped to add quinoa but wasn't sold until I found a recipe for lime quinoa. Add some mango and viola! We had this for dinner Monday night and it was amazing!!

Grilled Coconut Lime Chicken Salad with Quinoa and Tropical Fruit

Serves 4.

For the marinade and dressing:
5 Tablespoons peanut oil
1 Tablespoon coconut oil
Grated zest of 2 limes
2 teaspoons ground cumin
3 teaspoons ground coriander
4 Tablespoons reduced sodium soy sauce
3 teaspoons kosher salt
4 Tablespoons sugar
4 teaspoons curry powder
1 cup coconut milk

2 pounds boneless skinless chicken breast, pounded out to an even thickness, about 1/2 to 3/4 inch thick

Whisk together all the marinade ingredient in a medium sized bowl. Place the chicken and 3/4 cup to 1 cup of marinade in a gallon ziploc bag. Squeeze any air out of the bag, then continue turning the bag to make sure the chicken is coated in marinade. Place bag in refrigerator for at least two hours. Reserve the remaining marinade as dressing for the salad. Cover and refrigerate. Grill the chicken approximately 5 minutes per side over high heat, or until cooked thoroughly. Remove from grill; allow to cool and then slice for the salad. 

For the lime quinoa:
1/2 cup uncooked quinoa, rinsed
1 cup low-sodium chicken or vegetable stock, or even water
1 tablespoon coconut oil
1 lime, juiced and zest freshly grated
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper

Add the quinoa and stock (or water) to a saucepan over high heat and bring it to a boil. Once boiling, reduce the heat to low and cover the pot. Cook for about 15 minutes, or until all the liquid is absorbed. Stir in the coconut oil (you can swap butter), lime juice, zest, salt and pepper.

For the salad:
Romaine lettuce, chopped, about 5 ounces
Spinach, about 8 ounces
Prepared chicken
Lime quinoa
Mango (we used 2 nice ripe ones; one would be enough for 4 people)
Pineapple (we grilled half a pineapple the day before and chopped it for this salad; would be fine raw as well)
1 red bell pepper (we used left grilled red and green pepper and onion), sliced
4 carrots, cut into match sticks (or whatever shape you like!) 
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
1-2 limes, cut into wedges

To assemble the salad, make a bed of lettuce and spinach on each plate then add each of the toppings. Sprinkle cilantro on the chicken, or the whole salad. Serve with the reserved coconut lime dressing (which is especially delicious on the lime quinoa!). 

Lime coconut chicken recipe from Fine Cooking here; came to me via pinterest from this adaptation from Chaos in the Kitchen here. Lime quinoa recipe found here on How Sweet It Is.

Tuesday, May 20, 2014

Southwestern Salad

Summer of Salads continues: Southwestern Salad
It's the dressing that makes this salad really sing and for that we have the blog Damn Delicious to thank for this recipe.

Salad:
8 ounce package romaine hearts, cleaned and chopped
6 ounce package baby spinach
2 ears sweet corn, grilled, kernels removed from cob (we had corn the night before so I just prepared a couple extra ears)
1 14.5-ounce can seasoned black beans, drained and rinsed
2 avocados, pitted and cubed
1 pint grape tomatoes, sliced in half if large
1 portion of chicken of your choice per person (I used frozen chicken tenders we had in the freezer, cooked them ahead and let cool before serving - or omit the meat if you prefer!)

Cilantro Lime Dressing
1 cup cilantro leaves
1/2 cup Greek yogurt (we used Fage 2%)
2 cloves garlic
juice of one lime
2 pinches salt
2 Tablespoons apple cider vinegar
4 Tablespoons olive oil

The original directions used the food processor for this, but T loves the blender so we tried that. Put the cilantro, yogurt, garlic and lime juice in the machine of your choice. We added the vinegar as well so there'd be enough liquid to get the contents going. Once it's smooth, with the motor running, slowly add the olive oil. No need to make it in advance, but I'd recommend making it first and then assembling the salads. Letting it sit just that 10 minutes brings the flavors together. It stores well in the fridge too.

Serves 4


Monday, May 19, 2014

Summer of Salads

Mothers' Day keeps on giving .:)
I order Cobb salad a lot at restaurants and it never occurred to me until last year to make it at home. Crazy, right? It's super easy and just as delicious when you assemble it yourself.

Last Monday night we had Cobb salad from our Mothers' Day leftovers - some applewood smoked bacon (from the BLTs we had from lunch) and steak from dinner. Add some grape tomatoes, blue cheese and hard boiled eggs on top of romaine lettuce and dinner is done. Even Thomas ate it all (with a healthy amount of blue cheese dressing).

It was so tasty that I thought, hey, this should be the summer of salads. Keep the kitchen cool. Experiment with some new recipes. Eat a lot of veggies... It's a win-win. And I'll plan to share the best recipes here on the blog.

For inspiration, I set up a group pinterest board (let me know if you want to join!)

Follow Amy's board Summer of Salads on Pinterest.

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Take the 30x30 Challenge

A tweet from Ecowatch led me to this great project - David Suzuki Foundation's 30x30 Challenge, which is to spend at least 30 minutes in nature for the next 30 days (aka each day in the month of June). This 90 second video details the benefits:



Unless you live in Canada, you can't officially sign up but this is one Thomas and I will enjoy. June 1st is the first day of summer vacation here and we plan to start it bright and early at the park playing disc golf. Maybe we'll even share some photos!

For my reading friends, DSF has a book club that looks really interesting. Learn more about it here or check out this month's selection Your Brain on Nature: The Science of Nature's Influence on Your Health, Happiness, and Vitality by Eva M. Selhub, MD and Alan Logan, ND.

Monday, November 14, 2011

Fun with Cousins

We had good times with my cousins Andy and Karen and their kids Quinn and Helen who stopped at Mom's on their trip across the country last June. Here are some pictures from the day we spent with them and my brother and his family.
Mom is the pied piper of children!

Helen is 3 going on 30. Love her excellent questions.

It wouldn't be summer at Mom's without a fire by the pond.


Quinn and Ethan

Elliot still loves s'mores.

Trevor the Toad

Trevor the toad has his close-up.
He was released into the wild not long after when chasing fireflies became more exciting!

Monday, September 6, 2010

Two (ok 3) Great Songs to Say Goodbye to Summer

First song comes from Morganster and her song a day project; second and third are old favorites of mine.








Do you have any favorite farewell summer songs?
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