Tag: coconut

Chicken Breast Stuffed With Feta & Asparagus on Coconut Rice

The other day there was a fantastic special at the grocery store on marinated chicken breasts stuffed with feta and asparagus. It was a dish fresh from the butcher section and I thought it would make a lovely treat for the family. As a bonus, although this type of meal has a reasonably long cooking time, it’s not cooking that has to be supervised all that much, so it’s good for busy school nights.

I served the chicken on a bed of coconut rice made in the Instant Pot, using the ridiculously easy technique of substituting the water required 1:1 for light coconut milk. This kind of rice is currently the favourite of Thing 1, and it’s a regular request that I find I can easily acquiesce. The whole meal was ready in about 45 minutes, start to finish. I think it’s one that I’d like to make again, even if I do have to take the time to marinade and stuff the chicken breasts myself. I’m thinking that it might be nice to prepare them in bulk and then freeze them for easy meal prep on busier days. I don’t know if the texture of the veggies would suffer, though, so I think I’d have to give it a test run first.

Green Tea Salmon with Coconut Rice & Miso Greens

When I bought the salmon for yesterday’s dinner, I had the option of buying just enough for one meal at a rather high price, or picking up a club pack that would make two meals for only a dollar or two more. Bulk discounts are a really big thing here and, if you can work with it, can save you an awful lot of money. Owning a deep freeze is a great way to buy in bulk without having to eat the same thing for a week. However, most ocean fish that gets to us here is frozen, since we’re about 1,100km away from the Atlantic coast in our country, and 500km away if we drive south to the States. I didn’t want to re-freeze the extra salmon, so we ended up eating it two days in a row. I’d been itching to try out some of the recipes from my new-to-me copy of Jamie’s 15 Minute Meals (Jamie Oliver, 2012), and the green tea salmon with coconut rice & miso greens on page 138 looked like it was packed with flavour.

I like how this book gives very specific directions for how to prepare these dishes in the least amount of time. That being said, this dish definitely took more than 15 minutes, mostly because of the rice. The instructions call for basmati rice to cook in light coconut milk for only 10 minutes — but I have never managed to make decent basmati on the stove in less than 25, and I cook it a lot. I tried to shave off a little time by cooking it in the Instant Pot (which didn’t exist when this book was written), but with the preheating, a 12-minute automatic cook time, and 10 minutes of releasing pressure naturally, it was still closer to a 25-minute cooking time. So I had to time my other preparation around the rice so that all of the elements finished at the same time. That actually made things much easier for me, since I’m definitely slower at my knife-work than Jamie.

My other issue with this recipe, and it’s become a big of a pet peeveas I’ve written before, is that the ingredients aren’t measured by something objective like volume or weight. Rather, they were given such measurements as “bunches” or “thumb-sized”. It’s fine to be able to throw in a pinch of this and a dash of that once I know a recipe well, but when I’m trying it for the first time I want it to be as much like the original as possible. Also, a “bunch” can change size from store to store and season to season — and I’m pretty sure that we use slightly different varieties of veggies than over in the UK, so their sizes can vary considerably. This can throw off proportions and potentially ruin a recipe. In this recipe, I threw in a whole bunch of cilantro instead of half a bunch, because the bunches where I was shopping seemed really small. Also, I had to use broccoli instead of broccolini, since my local grocery store didn’t carry the latter at all; luckily that particular bunch also had an approximate weight measurement as well.

Despite my pickiness about the recipe, I was very happy with the final dishes. The salmon with its green tea coating was surprisingly delicious, the coconut rice was lovely (and so easy!), and the veggies were crisp and fresh-tasting. I think the dressing would have been better with a little olive oil added to thin it out, since it had such a strong flavour that you really didn’t need much. The oil probably would have made my poor old blender deal with the whole thing better too, since it didn’t like working with such small quantities or low levels of liquid (my blender is older than I am). I think that making this sauce into a salad dressing for fresh greens would be absolutely lovely — unless I’m making it for someone who finds that cilantro tastes like soap. Luckily, I’m not one of them!

Thai Chicken Coconut Curry

Last night I wanted to make a healthy and easy meal, so I went back to the Thai Coconut Curry Recipe and worked with what I had in the fridge and pantry. I used Blue Dragon Thai Red Curry Paste again, since I still had about 2/3 of a jar left in the fridge. As protein, I used chicken thighs, which I had bought in quantity a few days before due to a fantastic deal at the grocery store. For the veggies I used yellow zucchini, green zucchini, and garlic scapes, all of which are in season locally. Like with my Indian coconut curry (which in retrospect this version of the dish looks an awful lot like), I was running short on time, so I cooked the veggies on the stove. I also served it on rice.

The dish was very tasty, and my whole family ate it, which satisfies my most stringent criteria when it comes to cooking. Also, anything with that many veggies incorporated into it is better for both the health and the digestion. However, I think if I want a more attractively-coloured final product, I’ll have to make the time to roast the veggies. They seem to keep their original colour much better when roasted. Also, chicken and rice aren’t nearly as visually appealing on a plate as shrimp and egg noodles. Even so, this meal remains very versatile and super-easy to make, so I’ll probably keep making it regularly — with infinite variations, of course.

Indian Coconut Curry

Last night I decided to make coconut curry again, but with a more Indian flavour. The one that I made previously was more of a Thai dish (although certainly not an authentic one), mostly because I used Blue Dragon Thai Red Curry Paste. This time I used Pataks Mild Curry Paste; the company specializes in flavours originating in India.

As is probably evident from the picture, I made a few more changes, based mostly on what was in my fridge and pantry. I replaced the carrots with mushrooms, I switched the shrimp for chopped chicken breast, and I served the dish over rice instead of with noodles. Also notably, I ran out of time to roast the vegetables in the oven (which takes about an hour), so I cooked them up in a frying pan on the stove with the chicken once it was sealed. I also needed to boil down the sauce a bit once I added the curry paste and the light coconut milk because the veggies were more steamed than anything else and hence added a lot of moisture.

So I made a tonne of changes, but the dish still turned out successfully. This all goes to show how much you can mess with this recipe and still have great results! My kids ate all the food on their plates and then came back for seconds, which is how I rate dinner success in our house. Also, they ate all of their veggies without complaining, which is a huge win. Thank you, Brothers Green Eats, for introducing me to this dish!

Thai Coconut Curry Recipe

I’m trying to broaden my culinary horizons further, not only because I love eating new things, but also because I get bored of cooking the same things all the time. To that end, I’ve been perusing cookbooks and browsing YouTube cooking videos to find inspiration. One of the channels that I discovered was Brothers Green Eats (and I say I discovered because they’ve been posting cooking videos for about four years, but they’re new to me). I’ve really been enjoying working my way through their videos, and they’ve given me some great ideas.

This past Saturday I cooked up some coconut curry based on their Cooking “Cheat Codes” – Make Anything Taste Delicious tutorial, with the relevant bits about curry paste and coconut milk starting at about the 5:00 mark). This recipe is customized according to the ingredients that were available locally and seasonally, as well as to suit the tastes and dietary issues of my family. However, it is a very flexible technique that can be used with a wide variety of ingredients. You don’t have to use the brands that I did, either, but I thought it was necessary to note what worked well for me. This dish is dairy-free, and can easily be made vegetarian or vegan by omitting the meat; since it’s added more or less at the last step, the meat doesn’t have a huge amount to do with the development of the flavour. I should note right now that the curry paste that I used is not vegetarian or vegan, but I’m sure you could find one that is, or make one of your own to suit your personal dietary requirements.

I have a feeling that I will be making this recipe over and over again — especially since there are almost infinite variations available.

Thai Coconut Curry
Serves 4-6

Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C).
Please note: weight measurements for the vegetables in this recipe are taken after peeling and removing inedible portions like leaves and stems.
Wash and slice:
– 1 small onion (60g (2oz))
– 1 small yellow zucchini (200g (7oz))
– 1 small green zucchini (200g (7oz))
– 2 medium carrots (200g (7oz))
– 1 small eggplant (200g (7oz))
On a baking sheet, spread evenly:
– 2 Tbsp olive oil
– 1/4 tsp salt
– 1/8 tsp pepper
Add the sliced vegetables to the baking sheet. Mix them by hand or with a spatula until the vegetables are evenly coated with the oil and spice mixture.
Roast the vegetables in the oven at 350°F (175°C) for between 40 and 60 minutes, turning the veggies in the pan halfway through that time. The vegetables are done when they are tender but before they start to fall apart.
In the last 20 minutes or so of the roast vegetables’ cooking time, steam and drain:
– 150g (5.25oz) chopped baby bok choy
According to the package directions, cook until al dente and drain:
– 340g (12oz) medium egg noodles
In a large, deep, non-stick frying pan or non-stick wok, heat on medium heat:
– 1 Tbsp olive oil
Add to the oil:
– 3 Tbsp Blue Dragon Thai Red Curry Paste*
Cook for 1 minute, stirring regularly to prevent burning and sticking.
Add to the pan:
– one 398mL (13.5fl oz) can A Taste of Thai Lite Coconut Milk
Stir until ingredients in pan smoothly combined.
Add the roast vegetables, baby bok choy, and medium egg noodles to the pan. Stir until all solid ingredients are evenly coated. Add to the pan:
– 250g (9oz) peeled, cooked shrimp**
Stir until ingredients are heated and coated evenly.
Serve, optionally topping each dish with:
– a sprinkle of toasted sesame seeds

* Or curry paste of your choice.
**Or an equal amount of cooked chicken chopped into bite-sized pieces.