Sweet & spicy and garlic & lime chicken dinner

food

Planning dinner really gets me frustrated! There is no room for cheating or mistakes and when you are as exhausted as I am at the end of the day a one dish oven chicken dish sounds just about perfect!

Chicken breasts are a great source of lean proteins and with the availability of cleaned and cut chicken breasts this is easy peezy! I did add in boneless chicken thighs in my dish, feel free to use whichever pieces you like but remember this recipe is measured for boneless pieces!

What do you need?

You can adjust the measurements if you are cooking for 3 or more people. I made enough for 3 persons.

4 boneless chicken breasts and thighs

1.5 tablespoon of olive oil

A mix of chili sauce, honey and whole grain mustard, a tbsp of each. However if you have made the amazing sweet chili sauce you can use 2 tbsp of that and add a tbsp of mustard of choice. Also in that case decrease garlic to just one clove as the sweet chili sauce contains garlic. (I hadn’t tried out the sweet chili sauce when I cooked this!)

2 garlic cloves, roughly chopped

2 – 3 red or green chilies, chopped

Juice of half a lime

Roughly a cup of chopped cilantro

2 tbsp water

Salt and pepper to taste

Wash the chicken pieces and pat dry

Make sure to place a cling wrap over your cutting board when cutting raw pieces of meat. The juices get soaked into the boards, especially if they are wooden and basically the bacteria harvests in there and you do the math! Ech! Always remember to cling wrap your boards, may it be plastic, granite or wood when handling raw meats or fishes!

Cut the pieces into equal sizes, this completely depends on you! But make sure they are roughly equal so that they cook evenly.

Sprinkle with salt and pepper

Mix sauces together with the juice from the lime and add 2 tbsp of water. Mix and set aside.

Under medium heat, put half of the oil and sear the pieces to give some color and lock in the juices

Preheat the oven to 250 C ( I use a fan oven)

Place the remaining oil, cut chilies, cut garlic and half of the cilantro into an oven proof dish

Transfer the pieces into the prepared dish, try not to crowd them too much and then cover each piece completely with the sauce. Leave some to add on after the cooking process.

Place it in the oven and watch the cooking and caramelization happen!

It should take 30 – 35 minutes before its done. Turn the pieces half way through. The chicken is cooked when you insert a toothpick and the juices run clear! You can even take a piece and cut it to make sure! No one’s judging here!

Transfer the chicken into your serving dish and cover with foil.

Take the drippings from the dish and reduce it down. You can add in a tsp of cornstarch mixed with water to get a thicker sauce but honestly it’s not necessary!

Serve the chicken in slices or whole, smear it with the remaining sauce and garnish with cilantro.

Serve with a side of steamed crunchy vegetables!

This is easily a dish you can make for many people, its hassle free and you can really skip the searing part if you are feeling extra lazy!

Enjoy!

Why shouldn’t you mix Carbohydrates and Proteins?

food

This food plan that I follow is the one devised by Harvey and Marilyn Diamond. Their bestselling book “Fit for Life” was first published in 1985, and was re-released in 2010 and contains information in details. Buy the book

Here are the basics:

Till 12pm

You must only eat fruit, homemade smoothies in this period. No coffee, tea, toast etc. You can drink herbal teas, and water. This works as fruits have their own digestive enzymes and only takes 20-35 minutes to digest. Fruits also contain fructose which will aid you to give up sucrose, refined sugar!

Lunch

Carbohydrate + Vegetables (preferably steamed as it holds most nutrients)

(30:70 ratio)

Dinner

Protein + Vegetables (preferably steamed as it holds most nutrients)

(30:70 ratio)

Do not mix carbohydrates with proteins. Protein is digested by acid and carbohydrates are digested by alkaline. Alkaline cancels out acid and so the food consumed is not properly assimilated and is very difficult to digest.

Do not eat fruit after a main meal as it will ferment your meal.

Add a tablespoon of olive oil or coconut oil to main meals.

My daily everyday

Lifestyle

It’s good to be back home, rejuvenated from a month long holiday! Even though I followed my London routine while I was away, it’s simply not the same.

I used to be pretty much like a sloth before; I went to school, ate whatever, sedentary mostly, sleeping at strange hours (with sleep aid), woke up past noon. Oh! It was a mess!! And by the way I was always tired or felt sick just ask my husband or sisters.

Looking at my everyday now, I must say I have come a long way in just a few short months. Remember it takes 21 days to form a habit!

My day starts with me craving for the fruit smoothie. Blitz the fruits with some spinach and kale. Add in matcha green tea and then stir in some chia seeds.

Why matcha green tea? Why chia seeds?

I drink half of the smoothie an hour before training.

Train with Gary for an hour and half. By that time I am dead beat!

Within 20 mins of training, I drink a whey protein shake with water followed by multivitamins that’s when your body is craving for all that goodness! Then i head to work feeling quite full. At some point before lunch, I take the remaining portion of the smoothie.

Why whey protein?

I take lunch around 12:30 pm which consists of carbohydrates + veggies

Between lunch and dinner, I have 2 snacks.

Snack # 1: Either apple with nut butter or seeds or porridge. Anything that is slow releasing. Fruit or milk chia puddings are great too.

Snack # 2: Another whey protein shake with water.

Then I take dinner by 7:30 pm which consists of proteins + veggies

Why this food plan?

Around 9:30 pm I drink some chamomile or herbal tea

By 10:30 pm, I am already dying to sleep. This is so unlike me but I love it!

And all day I drink a lot of water (4 liters) in many forms and keep nuts and seeds handy. You never want to feel hungry thats a sign of your metabolism slowing down.

You just have to make it work around your schedule. Everyone’s life is different and there is no template to getting it just perfect. You devise your own plan and make it work for you! Just remember to add in all the goodness so each day you are one step towards your goal. Everything you put into your body should have a reason, when something doesn’t thats when you toss it out!

You decide what goes into your body, it deserves the best!

Fresh as fresh! Not your average tomato basil pasta

food

The pasta supper is clearly the most common ‘go to’ dish in most households. Its easy; boil some pasta, dump a jar of the store bought pasta sauce and add in some protein! Voila! You have food on the table!

There are a few problems with that:

1. White refined pasta: Choose whole wheat pasta over refined white pasta because it has fewer calories, carbohydrates, fats and higher fibers.

2. Store bought pasta sauce: Its full of preservatives and sugar! In a minute you’ll see that pasta sauce from ‘real’ tomatoes is not that bright red color!!!

3. Adding a protein into a carbohydrate intensive meal: Its a big no no in the food plan I follow, my next post will explain in details why there is no mixing!

So I present to you a fresh-fresh, healthy and yummy pasta dish that you can can serve guilt-free to your guests, kids or loved ones 🙂

What do you need?

250 gm (raw weight) whole wheat pasta – cooked

5 large tomatoes

1.5 cups sliced mushrooms

2 large garlic cloves, one chopped and one whole

Fresh basil leaves

4 sprays of oil of choice

1 teaspoon of EVOO

salt to taste

This will make 4 servings!

Cook the whole wheat pasta and set aside

Steam the tomatoes until completely softened

Spray the oil onto the pan on high heat, sauté the garlic and mushrooms. Add salt to taste.

Take the softened tomatoes and peel the skin off. It will come right off!

In a blender, add the tomatoes, teaspoon of EVOO, clove of garlic, basil and salt. Blitz together until well mixed and looks like a sauce. See I told you there’s no bright red color!

Transfer this sauce onto the pan containing the sautéed mushrooms and simmer in low heat for 5 minutes.

Add in the pasta bit by bit into the sauce until well incorporated.

Enjoy while warm!

You can add in chili for an extra kick!

You can also make the sauce ahead of time and mix together right before serving! Garnish with a fresh basil leaf!

Dinner: Sweet and spicy ground beef lettuce wraps

food

Lunch is always slightly easier than dinner as you have the whole day to burn it off incase you eat something extra. Dinner on the other hand is less forgiving which is why by 7:30 pm, I eat the proteins and vegetables!

I cross a Chinese restaurant almost everyday and today I woke up determined to eat a healthy version of my most favorite dish! Lettuce wraps without the excessive fats, sugars or MSG and I did it!

I also served it to some guests I had over today and they loved it! I was so happy to have served something healthy and fresh! You can easily make the filling ahead and put it together when your guests have arrived! Very versatile!

What do you need?

1 whole lettuce bulb

450 gram lean ground beef ( I used 5% fat ones)

(you could also use chicken or turkey mince)

1 cup diced peppers

1 cup diced carrots

2 tablespoons of good quality honey

2 tablespoons of chili sauce or to make it even healthier use chili flakes/paste

2 tablespoons wholegrain mustard

2 tablespoon finely chopped cilantro

3/4 cloves of garlic, finely chopped

3 sprays of your oil of choice

salt and pepper to taste

You will make enough for 3 dinners! 😀

In a bowl, mix together the honey, mustard and chili sauce with 2 tablespoons of water and set aside

Spray on the oil into the pan on high heat

Add in the garlic, peppers and carrot with a dash of water to soften and sauté

After sautéing for 2-3 minutes add in the ground beef and salt/pepper

Stir the beef and break it up and you will notice the ‘fatty juice’ collecting

Put the lid on and drain that liquid out, it is the fats from the ground beef and its gotta go!! Ech!

Return the pot onto the heat and stir in 2/3 of the mixture of honey/mustard/chili sauce that you had set aside.

Close the lid and let it cook for about 10 -12 minutes more. Make sure to stir occasionally during that time. You will notice the char on the beef and peppers and then add in that remaining honey/mustard/chili sauce mixture and the cilantro.

Keep tasting the beef as you cook! Thats just standard operating procedure 😀

Take it off the heat, arrange the lettuce and fill them in!

Enjoy while warm! I had it with a side of steamed mixed vegetables!

* You can also add in sweet and sour chili sauce in which case leave out the honey and chili sauce however I would highly recommend using a chili sauce and honey mixture as you eliminate the high amounts of sugar in those sweet and sour sauces.

* A great alternative would be to use a freshly made chili paste! That would be ideal especially if you used a mixture of fresh red chili and roasted chili. YUM! I will surely do that next time!

Also I do apologize for not including the calories, thats because I don’t calorie count and you shouldn’t either especially when you are eating clean and healthy!

Stoup (stew + soup) : Red lentils with squash and spinach

food

We often overlook the simpler ingredients when devising a healthier food plan, we think we need the fancier stuff and equipped with the usual excuse of, ‘its so expensive to eat healthy!.’ Its not.

Lentils are one of the best food source of slow-digesting carbohydrates! Perfect for lunch! It is an excellent source of fiber, folate, manganese and iron. It’s especially great because it is not like the usual carbohydrates like white rice or bread where your sugar levels spike immediately after consumption instead it takes its times to convert to glucose. Along with these, it has been proven that it aids colon health, diabetics and absorption of essential minerals like calcium.

Available everywhere and you can make it so delicious by simply boiling it and adding your favorite vegetables, even if you cant boil an egg you can boil lentils!

So this is what I made for lunch today, again it is extremely versatile to carry out and you can make it for 2/3 days at a time.

What do you need?

1 cup of red lentils

2 cups of butternut squash

2 cups of spinach

1/2 cup of cilantro

3 tsp of turmeric powder

1 cup of cooked brown rice

Sea salt to taste

This should yield 4 to 5 servings ( each serving is 1.5 cups)

Clean the red lentils under water until it runs clear

Cover the lentils with water making sure it is completely submerged. Add the turmeric powder and salt.

On medium heat, boil the lentils for about 10 minutes

Add in the butternut squash and cover the pot and let it simmer until the squash and lentils have completely softened.

Using a masher, mash the squash and lentils as it simmers

Add in the spinach

Mix together until the spinach wilts and take a taste. Beware it’s super hot! I say this from experience! Ouch!

Add in the cilantro

Allow it to simmer for an additional 5 minutes under very low heat. It’s ready!

Spoon the stoup (stew + soup) into a bowl and add a tablespoon of brown rice. The combination is perfect!

Enjoy! No fats, good carbs and lots of vegetables!

You can add any vegetables you want, pumpkin, beans, jalapeños, tomatoes, the list goes on and on! You can even skip on the rice but the texture really adds a little something.

It was a perfect meal on this cold London afternoon especially on a day I was feeling extremely homesick .

Lunch: Vegetable fried rice

food

Lunch is one of those meals that really helps you get through the day! There are such high expectations from lunch, it needs to fuel you and must be versatile enough to take to work/school/etc. Here’s a recipe that fits the bill, it’s packed with nutrients, you can make it once for 2/3 days and it’s holds well to carry out.

Remembering the 70:30 ratio of vegetables:carbohydrates I will give you only an approximation of how much vegetable you should add. Please feel free to add more!

Every household usually has their own fried rice recipe, stir fried vegetables, eggs, protein, rice together….but remember no mixing carbs and proteins! Here’s the trick to avoid stir frying those beautiful vegetables in oil and stripping it off it’s nutrients.

Steam them first! The steamer is my new best friend!

What will you need?

1 cup cooked and cooled brown rice
1 cup broccoli
1 cup carrots
1 cup mushrooms
1 cup green/red peppers
2/3 cloves of chopped garlic
1/2 cup cilantro
1/2 cup spring onions
1 tbsp low sodium soy sauce
Sea salt to taste

Cook and cool the brown rice

Steam the broccoli, carrots, peppers and mushroom till just tender. Make sure they don’t get soggy.

In a hot wok, add 3 sprays of your oil of choice and toast the garlic. Add in steamed vegetables and stir.

Add in the brown rice and stir together. Add salt to taste and soy sauce.

Mix well and add in chopped cilantro and spring onion. Mix together and serve!

You can add a medley of vegetables to your liking. Corn and peas are a great addition! Store extra fried rice in air tight container and it will stay well for 4/5 days in the fridge. This should make you at least 4 servings!

Enjoy!

Food Plan : Not a diet plan

food, Lifestyle

So I used to be obsessed with counting calories, I had every app ever to count my daily intake! I didn’t realize while I was focused on the overall calorie count I was avoiding the ‘real’ information i needed to monitor. Sugars sugars sugars!!!!

A low fat yoghurt that I was happily eating on my ‘diet’ contained about 45g of sugar/ 8 fl oz while a full fat whole milk yoghurt contained 12g of sugar/ 8 fl oz!!!!!!!! Mind blown! Read your labels! Most countries (if any) DO NOT regulate the addition of sugars so while there maybe no fat, it is getting compensated with a huge chunk of sugar!

Basically our bodies respond to sugar like any other euphoria enhancing drug, I’m sure we are all guilty of that great feeling while eating our favorite bar of chocolate but ever notice the absolute hell-ish feeling afterwards? That’s the crash! Now you need more chocolate to make yourself feel better. Thus begins the vicious cycle!

Here’s a way to curb/cut off your cravings for refined sugars:

Eat fruits till lunch, fruits contain fructose which does not abruptly cause sugar fluctuations in your body and takes it’s time to digest unlike sucrose in refined sugar. So your body gets that dose of sugar you are unintentionally craving and slowly you will lose your dependency on sucrose and turn to fructose! It took me a whole month! (morning smoothie recipe to follow)

So once that’s covered, here’s the simple plan:

Do not mix carbohydrates and proteins!

Eat the carbohydrates for lunch like brown rice, whole wheat pasta, grains, quinoa, etc mixed with vegetables.

Eat lean proteins like chicken, turkey, fillet, etc mixed with vegetables for dinner.

Take minimal oil by using the spray.

Snack on seeds, nut butters and never ever let yourself feel hungry! That’s the sign of your metabolism going down a notch!

Lastly, water water water is your best friend! (Flavored waters post to follow)

Give it a shot! It is super easy especially when eating out! Just think before you eat!

fklifestyle

Sometimes the smallest step in the right direction ends up being the biggest step of your life. Tip toe if you must, but take the step!

vegetables

Sweet & spicy and garlic & lime chicken dinner

Why shouldn’t you mix Carbohydrates and Proteins?

My daily everyday

Fresh as fresh! Not your average tomato basil pasta

Dinner: Sweet and spicy ground beef lettuce wraps

Stoup (stew + soup) : Red lentils with squash and spinach

Lunch: Vegetable fried rice

Food Plan : Not a diet plan