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Cook This: Easy Taco Dinner (Gluten-free, Dairy-free)

By Dr. Samantha Brody, On March 25, 2012

I’m not much of a prepackaged mix kind of cook but for tacos I’m all about that package. When I was growing up we had tacos often and when I found a health food-ish version of the mix my mom used, I added tacos to my grown-up comfort food list (along with hot dogs and beans with melted “cheese” but that’s another post.)

There are several brands of taco mix available at the health food store and I have settled on Bearitos (wow, that may be one of the most dated websites I’ve seen in ages) as my favorite. Again, it might not actually be the best one but it is the one that most approximates my childhood favorite.

The great thing about this dinner is it’s easy. And it can be quick depending upon how many different toppings you want to have available. I also offer my boys a choice of taco meat on salad greens (low carb), baked corn chips, soft corn tortillas or fried taco shells. Usually  it ends up being some combination for my kid, soft tacos for me, and salad for my husband.

There are a few options for what kind of meat to use. We tend to do buffalo, but I also recommend grass fed and finished beef, or you can even use chicken or turkey. When we ate soy I used to use half beef and half firm tofu that had either been frozen/crumbled or had the water squeezed out with a cheese cloth. You could probably also cut the meat with tempeh but that is an acquired taste so go for it if you know what you’re getting into. The package will have directions and I usually use about 3/4 of the package instead of the whole thing because it’s pretty salty.

Toppings: shredded romaine hearts, fresh or drained canned OG tomatoes, avocado, marinated onions, jalapeños, sliced olives, or whatever strikes your fancy. We don’t eat cheese but there is a non-dairy non-soy cheese called Daiya that we really like and sometimes I’ll melt this over the chips or meat before  I serve it.

The really fun thing about this meal is that everyone can build their own dinner. Oh, and don’t forget to serve it with a side vegetable. Always a side vegetable.

Enjoy!

-Dr Samantha

Cook This: Massaged Kale with Almond Butter Dressing

By Dr. Samantha Brody, On February 27, 2012

I’ve been cooking healthy food for 20+ years. I’ve worked in a macrobiotic restaurant. I’ve worked at the deli at a health food store. I’ve worked catering gigs. And I’ve taken countless classes in vegetarian cooking. But I have never, ever, heard of massaging kale.

My husband, who can barely cook his way out of a paper bag (ok, with the exception of whole grain scratch pancakes- he can totally rock those suckers), came home from visiting a friend of ours in Seattle and announced that he had learned a great new way to prepare raw kale. I was suspicious at best. He explained that she had him massage the kale for 10-15 minutes, squeezing it as hard as he could and the result was soft and yummy kale salad.

Within 24 hours I was set up in my kitchen to give it a try, partly because it seemed so ridiculous. But sure enough cowboy, it worked! And even better, I suspected it would go more quickly and easily if you actually massaged oil into it. Bingo!

Now to decide how to dress it. I remembered a pretty decent dish that I learned how to make about 25 years ago when I was following some absurd detox program. It was shredded carrots and celery with a dressing of almond butter and apple juice. But I don’t particularly like celery so the recipe settled into the recesses of my mind, until now. The dressing would work well here, I was certain.

The first time I made it I used regular kale, boxed OG apple juice and roasted almond butter. The second time I made it I used lacinato kale, raw almond butter and unpasteurized apple juice. The second round was tastier but I’m not sure if it was the different kale or the quality of the ingredients that made the difference. I’ll see if I can work that out. Please give me your feedback if you try it both ways.

Ingredients

• 1 medium sized head of kale
• 4 medium carrots
• 1 TBSP olive oil
• 1/4 to 1/3 cup almond butter
• 1/4 to 1/3 cup apple juice
• Optional one inch piece of ginger
• Pinch or two of salt if your almond butter was unsalted

Instructions

1. Clean kale, remove tough center rib and rip into pieces.
2. Grate 4 carrots.
3. Pour oil on kale and massage it for about five minutes as if you’re kneading dough or giving someone a really deep back massage. You can add a little more oil here if you like. The pile should reduce in size by about 50% by the time you’re done.
4. Add grated carrots to kale.
5. Mix apple juice, almond butter and salt together with a fork. If you want the dressing a little thinner you can add some water. Here is where you would grate (on a ginger grater) ginger and squeeze the juice in if you go for the ginger part.
6. Pour dressing over kale and carrots and toss well.

I’m on a kick to eat a head of kale every 2-3 days. This is helping.

 

Enjoy!

Dr. Samantha

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cook This: Ling Cod Fish Tacos

By Dr. Samantha Brody, On February 19, 2012

I originally found the recipe for Scrumptious Halibut Fish Tacos on Epicurious about 4 years ago. I bookmarked it and have gone back at least a dozen times. This time though, I wanted a slightly less expensive fish for a weekday meal so I asked Lyf at Flying Fish Co what he thought would work well. It took him about 5 seconds to choose Pacific ling cod. It was fresh, never frozen, about half the price of halibut, and Lyf was 100% sure. And really, who am I to doubt the fishmonger?

There are a few other changes I made because I didn’t want to buy pre-julienned carrots or non-organic broccoli slaw. And next time I’m going to make my own tortillas. I bought a tortilladora about a year ago (I’m a sucker for kitchen gadgets) and my first try was a disaster but I really need to get back on that.

I served the tacos as shown with a side of refried black beans. My five year old came up with that idea and was thrilled it helped everything “stick” so well inside the tortilla. And if you wanted to make this even lower in carbs you really could serve the fish over the slaw and skip the tortilla.

 

INGREDIENTS

• 1 lb Pacific ling cod (these fish are actually unrelated to cod) or other mild but meaty fish cut into pieces about 1 x 3 inches.
• 1-2 T Olive oil
• Flour for dredging fillets. I’ve used whole spelt flour for this and last night tried a coconut flour to make it GF. It didn’t work great. I’ll use corn meal next time.
• 1 bag of corn tortillas

SLAW DRESSING

• 1/2 C fresh lime juice
• 1/3 C honey
• 2 T olive oil
• salt and pepper to taste
• 1 tsp. cumin powder (better fresh ground from seeds but not necessary)

SLAW

• 1 1/2 C thinly sliced red cabbage
• 1 C shredded carrots
• 1/2 med. red onion slivered
• 3 T rough chopped cilantro (on the topic of kitchen gadgets, just bought these- love!)

GARNISHES

• 1 sliced avocado
• 3 scallions diced
• fresh diced jalapenos (optional)

I serve with lime wedges, avo, refried black beans (amy’s are my favorite), scallions and fresh jalapenos.

 

Enjoy!

Dr Samantha

Cook This: Meatoaf Muffins- Gluten and dairy free goodness

By Dr. Samantha Brody, On February 14, 2012

A patient recently told me she made up a recipe for “buffaluffins.” Buffalo meat muffins. Brilliant, I thought. And look what was sitting in my fridge- a pound of grass fed grass finished beef waiting to be made into burgers. Forget it! Muffins it is. The first round was good. Not great. I tweaked the recipe a bit to add more veggies and took out a few things I threw in there that didn’t work (flax seeds for one- not sure what I was thinking.) Bingo.

Note: this recipe includes cooked quinoa which I would recommend making the night before so it will be cool for mixing into the meatloaf. Here is a great link for instructions on cooking it. I take a simpler approach and just go 2:1 (ish) with water to quinoa but her instructions lead to a better result texturally.

Ingredients:

• 1 lb grass fed/grass finished ground beef
• 1-2 TBSP olive oil
• 1 medium onion: minced
• 2 medium or one large carrot: minced
• 2-3 cups of chard cut into tiny strips- packed tightly into measuring cup
• 1 cup cooked quinoa
• 1 egg
• 2 TBSP tomato paste
• ¼ tsp salt
• pepper grinder with whole pepper

Instructions

1. If you haven’t cooked quinoa, do so now. See above.
2. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
3. While quinoa is cooking heat 1 TBSP oil in sauté pan over medium heat. Once hot add minced onion. Sauté about 5 minutes or until onion is soft and starting to brown. Add carrots. Cook until just soft. Add chard and cook until soft. Please note at any time if you need a little more olive oil, feel free to add it.
4. Remove from heat and put in large bowl to cool. When it’s slightly cool add quinoa, tomato paste, egg, salt and a few turns of pepper to the bowl. Mix well. I use my hands.
5. Add meat. Mix.
6. Add egg. Mix.
7. Roll into balls and drop into muffin tin. This recipe made 8 muffins for me.
8. Cook 15-20 min until cooked through.

You can serve with red sauce or ketchup. A good side dish with this is sautéed spinach or kale. And a salad. Of course.

Here’s a nutritional breakdown per muffin. Calories: 179, Carbs: 9g, Protein 13g, Fiber 2g, Fat 11g.

Enjoy!

-Dr Samantha

 

Cook This: Buffalo and Lamb Meatloaf in a Skillet.

By Dr. Samantha Brody, On October 31, 2011

I was a vegan for years. Though I felt comfortable with the idea that humans by nature are omnivores I just couldn’t wrap my head around how animals were being treated on large commercial farms.

This went along fine for a while but I eventually found myself in a bit of a pickle as I developed sensitivities to soy (couldn’t digest it) and wheat (made me very tired.) These were my main sources of protein. Around this time I also got mono and my body just wasn’t able to kick it. One of my doctors suggested that I try eating more protein (as in meat) and I was so desperate I decided to give it a try with the caveat that I would eat it only if I knew the animals hadn’t been subjected to unhealthy or unkind conditions.

I started by reintroducing fish and found my body thrived on the protein. Over the next 5 years I gradually added in more meat. I was thrilled to find that I lost weight and gained back the energy I’d lost years before.

We started buying cow shares about five years ago and this year branched out to lamb as well. And now there’s Lyf at Flying Fish Co. He runs, well, a meat shack on SE Hawthorne. I’ll write more about his place later but suffice it to say we now have access to just about any kind of seasonal fish or meat you can think of- all ethically raised and slaughtered.

This week for our menu we wanted to use some of our lamb so my husband and I curled up with my mother’s day present Good Meat. We found a meatloaf recipe that called for lamb and beef. I substituted buffalo for the beef so there was a combination of both fatty and lean meat.

Ingredients:

• 3 pieces of stale whole grain bread- we used Nature Bake spelt bread
• ¼ cup MimicCreme- the recipe calls for cream but we don’t eat dairy in our home
• 1 small onion
• 1 stalk celery
• 1 carrot
• 2 eggs, beaten
• leaves from 4 sprigs of thyme
• 10 chopped sage leaves
• 1 tsp sea salt
• Fresh ground black pepper to taste
• 1 pound grass fed and finished buffalo (original recipe calls for beef)
• 1 pound pastured lamb
• 4 slices of bacon

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

1. Either food-process or otherwise grind or crumble bread. We only had fresh bread so I crumbled it. Pour cream over bread to mix/soften.
2. Cut onion, celery and carrot into very, very small dice. Alternatively you could use a food processor but I really like the process of dicing and have a tendency to over-pulsing.
3. Chop sage.
4. Add vegetables and herbs to bread/cream mixture. Hand toss.
5. Add 2 beaten eggs. Hand toss.
6. Add meat. Mix until uniform.
7. Press mixture into 10 inch cast iron skillet.
8. Pat down to shape.
9. Criss-cross the bacon on top of the meatloaf.
10. Cook for about an hour or until center is heated to 155 degrees. Let sit for 15 min before serving or storing in refrigerator.

Note: I drained the extra oil out of the pan with a turkey baster as our ‘loaf’ gave off over half a cup of fat.

My plan is to make a tomato paste sauce for this dish as when I was a child my mother served it that way. I’m a little afraid to ask her what she put in it but I’ll keep you posted.

Enjoy!

Dr. Samantha

Edited to add: My husband had a brilliant idea to add nutritional information to the recipes! This meatloaf serves 8 and per serving 311calories, 26 g protein and 11 g of carbs. I’m not including fat because I’m not sure if it’s accurate as I drained off such an enormous amount after cooking.

Cook This: Lemon Walnut Green Beans v2.1

By Dr. Samantha Brody, On April 18, 2011

I had another lemon-walnut green bean recipe up a few months back but the original poster took the recipe down. I decided to make some changes and ended up with this deliciousness. Please note there is no accompanying photo because when I tried to take one it looked awful. Trust me though, they are delicious and don’t look that bad. Really. (Edited to add: I made this again this week because I wanted to try to figure out how to make it look better! The first time I didn’t use an ice water bath for them and this time I did. Night and day. The color is stunning so I added the photo.)

• 1 ½ lb organic green beans with tips trimmed
• Zest of one lemon
• 3 TBSP lemon juice (usually 1-2 lemons)
• 1 ½ tsp Dijon mustard
• 1/3 cup olive oil
• 2+ TBSP minced shallots
• 1 TBSP finely minced chives
• 1 cup toasted walnuts

Beans:

• Steam or boil green beans to desired tenderness. I like them slightly al dente.
• As soon as they are done either rinse in cold water or if you want to bother, you can drop them into a bowl of ice water to quickly blanch them. The color of the green beans is much more vibrant if you do this.
• Drain them in a colander and pour out onto a dish cloth to let them dry off a bit before you mix them with the dressing.

Walnuts:

You can either lay the nuts out in a single layer on a baking sheet and put them under the broiler for a few minutes (tossing when they begin to turn golden-brown.) Or, you can cook them in a dry pan over medium heat also tossing as they start to brown. Either way you have to pay close attention that they don’t burn. I always go with the pan technique due to a still-fresh memory of one unfortunate incident a few years back that involved my oven, a few cups of crushed hazelnuts and an expired fire extinguisher. Oh, and if you cut them up before you toast them you will find that little skin bits burn. I like the slightly burned taste so I do it this way but if that’s not your preference, toast them whole then chopthem up.

Dressing:

• Zest one large lemon and put aside.
• Whisk together lemon juice, mustard, olive oil and shallots.

Putting it together:

• Toss the beans with the dressing.
• Add zest.
• If you are eating it all right away go ahead and add the nuts and then sprinkle chives on each serving. Otherwise, put aside the part you want now, add the appropriate amount of nuts and chives (proportionally) and store the rest in the fridge in separate containers until you’re going for the leftovers. If the nuts sit in there they get pretty soggy…ick.

Enjoy!

-Dr Samantha

 

Cook This: Grilled Monster Pork Chops with Tomatillo and Green Apple Sauce (not to be confused with applesauce.)

By Dr. Samantha Brody, On March 21, 2011

We had a few double cut pork chops in our freezer from, oh, about 9 months ago. Even though we had used the Seal-a-Meal Food Saver I was worried they’d be too old. Not so! They didn’t even smell a little bit like freezer. I have to add here that the Food Saver is a fabulous investment. For us it has been great not only for keeping food fresh a little longer but also allowing us to always have a healthy meal or two on hand, a must for a full-time doctor mama whose part-time architect husband isn’t exactly independent in the kitch.

But back to the pork chops. I honestly haven’t enjoyed a meal this much in ages. It was hit for everyone. I even got a double thumbs up from my 4 year-old. He reserves this for only the most “abominable” (phenomenal) dishes.

The most complicated part of this dish by far was cooking the pork chops on the grill- and I won’t take credit for that, my husband is the family grill master. This makes me very happy (both of the above.)

We served the chops with Romaine, Avocado and Smoky Corn Salad with Chipotle Dressing and quinoa. I’ll post the salad recipe later this week if I can get to it. And for the record the boy piled up the sauce and quinoa on the slices of pork. He also helped himself to several spoonfuls of the sauce (twice) which he ate as a side dish.

The recipe is from epicurious.com

As past visitors know, I usually mess with recipes but I did this one almost verbatim (cut and pasted below with my changes in parentheses.)

For pork chops

• 3 tablespoons ground coriander
• 3 tablespoons ground cumin
• 2 1/2 tablespoons kosher salt
• 1 1/2 tablespoons black pepper
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 4 (2-inch-thick) loin pork chops (each about 1 lb)- we had 2 in the freezer, so that’s what I used

For tomatillo and green apple sauce

• 1/2 lb fresh tomatillos (about 5), husks discarded and tomatillos rinsed  (I used 3/4 lb.)
• 2 medium Granny Smith apples
• 1/2 cup loosely packed fresh cilantro sprigs
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1/4 cup apple juice
• 1 tablespoon fresh lime juice
• 1 tablespoon mild honey
• 1 teaspoon minced canned chipotle chiles in adobo (I used a little less because we were serving this to our 4 year old. It was still spicy, just-right spicy.)

Marinate chops:
Stir together coriander, cumin, salt, and pepper in a small bowl, then add oil and stir until combined well. Rub spice mixture all over chops. Let chops marinate while making sauce and preparing grill.

Make sauce:
Simmer tomatillos and 3 cups water in a 2 1/2- to 3-quart saucepan, uncovered, stirring occasionally, until tomatillos are just soft, 8 to 10 minutes. Drain and cool 15 minutes.

While tomatillos are cooling, core apples and cut into 1/4-inch dice (I cut them smaller than that). Purée tomatillos with remaining sauce ingredients except apples in a food processor. Transfer to a bowl and stir in apples.

To cook pork using a charcoal grill:
Open vents on bottom of grill. Light charcoal (80 to 100 briquettes) in chimney starter. Leaving about one quarter of grill free of charcoal, bank lit charcoal across rest of grill so that coals are about three times higher on opposite side.

Charcoal fire is medium-hot when you can hold your hand 5 inches above rack over area where coals are piled highest for 3 to 4 seconds. Sear pork on lightly oiled grill rack directly over hottest part of coals, uncovered, turning over once and, if necessary, moving around grill to avoid flare-ups, until well browned, 10 to 12 minutes total. Move pork to coolest part of grill, then cover with inverted roasting pan and grill, turning pork over once, until thermometer inserted diagonally into center of each chop (avoid bone) registers 150°F, 10 to 12 minutes total. Transfer pork to a cutting board and let stand, loosely covered with foil, 15 minutes (temperature will rise to 155°F).

To cook pork using a gas grill:
Preheat all burners on high, covered, 10 minutes. Sear pork on lightly oiled grill rack, covered with lid, turning over once, until well browned, 10 to 12 minutes total. Turn off 1 burner (middle burner if there are 3) and put pork above shut off burner. Reduce heat on remaining burner(s) to moderate and grill pork, covered with lid, until thermometer inserted diagonally into center (avoid bone) registers 150°F, 12 to 16 minutes. Transfer pork to a cutting board and let stand, loosely covered with foil, 15 minutes (temperature will rise to 155°F).

Serve pork:
Cut pork away from bone, then thinly slice and serve with sauce.

Enjoy!

Dr Samantha

 

 

 

 

Cook This (or heat it up, anyway): Quick Meals.

By Dr. Samantha Brody, On January 11, 2011

To say it’s been a busy month would be the understatement of the century. Year end inventory. Two newly trained front desk folks. Patients trying to get in before their deductibles reset. Then our freshly trained, lovely new front desk hire was offered a job closer to home, with better hours and in the field she’s been hoping to break into. We’re sad to see her go and wish her joy and success in her new venture. Her replacement, 2 days into training found it wasn’t the right fit for her skill set or personality. Another round of hiring and tomorrow we start afresh with training for our fabulous new office assistant.

What does that have to do with cooking? It means I haven’t. My weekend cooking days for the last 7 weeks have been spent nose to the grindstone behind my desk instead of flitting about the kitchen in my apron and slippers. Pizza and take out for my family seems to be the only way to go. But wait! We don’t do pizza and take-out. So my husband has been making gourmet meals and having them waiting for me on the table when I get home. But wait! My husband couldn’t cook his way out of a paper bag (ok, that’s an exaggeration but really, it’s not pretty.)

So…here are some ideas for quick dishes (or meals) that don’t require much prep time. Not as good as putting all the time and love into it that I usually do, but still landing healthy food on the table.

1. Spinach and garlic. Take 3 boxes of frozen spinach and put in a strainer. Run under hot water until thawed. Squeeze out well. Throw a big splash of olive oil in a sauté pan and add 5 cubes of frozen garlic (Trader Joes) or a tsp of pre-chopped garlic from a jar (New Seasons.) Cook garlic for a few minutes until just starting to brown and add spinach. Toss for 3 minutes or until warm.

2. Chicken sausage. Pick up chicken sausage from the meat department from the health food store. Boil until cooked. Brown in a pan. We also sometimes cook it then slice it and brown it in little slices. Cook extra and freeze it then next time you can just pull it out of the freezer in the morning and it will be ready for dinner.

3. Quinoa. Bring two cups of water or stock (I like pacific simply stock) to a boil in a medium-sized saucepan. Add one cup of rinsed quinoa to the boiling liquid. Return to a boil and then reduce the heat to low. Cover and simmer for about 15 minutes. Check the quinoa to make sure the water is absorbed into the grain if not, leave on a little longer. Remove the pan from the heat and let it stand for a few minutes.Fluff with fork.

1+2+3= fabulous meal combo separate or all mixed in a pan prior to serving.

4. Salad with protein. Salad mix (wash it, even if it is “pre-washed,” trust me.) Grate carrots and beets (peel first) into the salad. Toss in a few handfuls of nuts or seeds. Consider a thinly sliced apple or pear. Maybe some cucumber? Whatever you’ve got that sounds good. Protein options- poach salmon in a little water with a squeeze of lemon, canned tuna mixed with a bit of organic mayo, sliced steak, chicken breasts, deli turkey from the health food store chopped up into bite sized pieces. Again, whatever you’ve got.

5. Roasted chicken. Get a cooked chicken from the store. Serve with steamed broccoli, a salad and whole grain bread with olive oil and garlic.

6. Hot dogs and beans (a staple at our house and a Brody tradition on Christmas eve- don’t ask). Walnut acres baked beans. Whatever your regional well treated non-chemmie chicken hot dog brand happens to be. Heat beans in pan with sliced hot dogs. Serve with 1 or 2 veggie side dishes.

7. Tomato soup. I adapted this recipe from the Muir Glen website. Follow instructions but you can use frozen basil cubes from Trader Joes if you don’t have fresh herbs, olive oil not butter, skip the sugar (tomatoes are sweet enough) and use mimiccreme instead of whipping cream. Also I use pacific simply chicken stock or just water for the broth. We use a hand blender, which I highly recommend as part of your kitchen set up. Serve with whole grain toast and spinach (as above), steamed broccoli, or side salad.

8.Guatemalica (yes, we made that up). We adopted our son from Guatemala and when we were visiting him it was easier not to haul down to the restaurant every night so we had plenty of dinners in our tiny hotel apartment. The stand by? Just what they would serve us in the restaurant for breakfast (desayuno chapin). Eggs sauteéd with onion and tomato, sliced avocado, refried beans (from a pouch) and corn tortillas. I’m not sure why refried beans in Guatemala come in a pouch and in America they come in a can but other than that we have repeated it countless times. In Guatemala they serve it with plantains, which we didn’t do in our apartment, but we often do here, I’ll post that recipe soon.

9. Pasta and meat sauce. Cook some whole grain pasta, any shape, any size. While it is cooking, sauté an onion in a fry pan. Add a pound of range fed beef, buffalo, ground turkey, ground chicken or TVP if you must. When cooked through add a jar of muir glen or your favorite pasta sauce. Check the label though, many brands of commercial sauce are sweetened with corn syrup. Don’t eat that. Add a bag or two of frozen spinach to the sauce- we usually thaw and squeeze it out first so it doesn’t get too watery. It would be even better to add fresh spinach but we’re more likely to have frozen around for those quick meal nights. You can serve this with a side veggie too.

I can think of a few more but this post is getting a bit long so I’ll call it here.

Enjoy!

Dr Samantha

Cook This: Lemon-Walnut Green Bean Salad.

By Dr. Samantha Brody, On December 16, 2010

This recipe (and photo too) is pulled directly from a lovely blog called “The Whole Life Nutrition Kitchen.” Some of the recipes are a bit bland for me but others have become staples in our kitchen. This lemon-walnut green bean salad is fabulous. I’ll just post the link as it’s great as-is. The one thing she recommends is adding the walnuts at the end when it’s ready to serve but I kind of like the way they soak up the dressing over the week. That said, it does look pretty nasty after sitting in the fridge for 4 days. Still delicious though.

Oh, one note, the recipe calls for a product called Herbamare. We bought it for this recipe but I think it would be fine to use sea salt, some ground pepper and perhaps a pinch of marjoram, rosemary and/or thyme.

Enjoy!

-Dr Samantha

Cook This: Thai Chicken with Shallots and Basil

By Dr. Samantha Brody, On November 8, 2010

I’ve been buying Cook’s Illustrated at our local health food store for years. Not until about a year ago did I realize that it is the magazine version of a PBS series called America’s Test Kitchen. We don’t get cable (gasp!) so to find a good cooking show on network TV is a crazy jackpot for me.

The fabulous thing about this magazine (and show) is that they try technique after technique to come up with the easiest and tastiest way to cook any dish, or type of dish that they’re discussing. They then present not only the ‘how-to’ but also the ‘how-not-to.’ This is particularly good for me because I have a tendency to try to cut corners if I think I can get away with it. Although I’m not sure how the February Cook’s Illustrated ended up on the top of my magazine pile this week, I was excited to find a recipe for Thai chicken that didn’t contain soy, or so I thought. Turns out (of course) that oyster sauce has soy in it. As I had already purchased everything for the recipe I went ahead and made the dish replacing the oyster sauce with coconut aminos. Not the same by any stretch of the imagination but the final result was authentic tasting and delicious. Good enough for me.

I was about to link to the recipe with discussion but it’s subscription only so I’ll post what I did, which is of course, different than the actual recipe (I’m like that). The subscription is $35/year and would be worth it if you’re looking to gain some basic cooking skill or hone basic cooking skills. You can get a 24 hour free pass to the website so if you want to read the actual recipe or the details about why they use certain techniques.

Ingredients

• 2 cups fresh basil tightly packed
• 4 cloves of garlic
• 1 medium jalapeño pepper
• 2 TBSP thai fish sauce (Thai kitchen brand has one with no additives, etc.)
• 1 T coconut aminos
• 2 tsp white vinegar
• 2 tsp raw sugar or agave
• 1.25 lb free range or organic chicken thigh meat cut into 2-3 inch pieces
• 5 large shallots
• 2 TBSP high heat stable oil

Directions

1. Put 1 cup of the basil leaves, the garlic and the chiles in the food processor. Pulse until finely chopped, scraping down if needed.
2. Take out 1 T of the mixture, place in small bowl, and stir in 1 T fish sauce, liquid aminos, vinegar, and sugar, set aside. Put the rest of the mixture in a large skillet or sauté pan.
3. Without cleaning food processor, add the meat and the rest of the fish sauce and pulse until it is in small pieces, about 1/4″. Put this in the refrigerator until you’re done with step 4.
4. Add oil and shallots to mixture in pan. Cook over medium-low heat, stirring regularly until the shallots are starting to turn light golden brown. Cooking slowly here, according to the cookbook author, is imperative. The recipe called for 5-8 minutes but it took about 12 minutes on my stove before they started turning color. The smell in the kitchen at this point should be making your mouth water.
5. Add the chicken, turn up to medium heat and cook until the chicken is just translucent. Now add the sauce you put aside in step 2.
6. Continue to stir until the chicken is cooked then add the rest of the basil until it wilts into the dish. WAIT on this step if you are cooking for another day (I think this dish would be ideally served hot off of the burner but on our menu this week it’s Tuesday’s dinner…)

The original recipe calls for serving the dish with extra fish sauce, sugar, red pepper flakes and vinegar in separate side dishes so people can adjust to their own taste. I’m pretty sure I won’t bother with all that…but I will put a bottle of vinegar and some hot pepper flakes on the table.

At this point my plan will be to serve it over black or brown rice with sauteéd broccoli and garlic. I bet it would also be good wrapped in rice paper and dipped in more of the sauce. I’ll try that next time.

Enjoy!

-Dr Samantha

• Samantha Brody, ND LAc

  

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