fuck diet

brown dress with white spots

I having not been posting of late as I have been trying to be healthly and detox just a little bit, so hence there is really nothing interesting to post.  Just lots of broccoli and soup, boring and plain and I have just about had enough.  Hopefully something interesting soon.

chipotle mango barbeque sauce

I came across this recipe for chipotle mango bbq sauce from here at Iowagirleats.com.
I love sauces and condiments and I wanted another recipe using fresh mango as they are readily available at the moment.

Follow the recipe, combine all the ingredients and bring to boil and simmer for 20 minutes.  I added an extra tablespoon of brown sugar as the sauce is really spicy hot.

Let it cool down before you blitz it.
We used the sauce in a yogurt dressing as the recipe suggests in a salad.  This dressing would go with so many things, seafood for one.  I loved it.

chicken mango salad

We had this salad on Friday night which was originally made with green prawns. I made it again on Saturday using the leftover greens, but used BBQ chicken thighs instead, which also works really well with the mango and the lime and sesame dressing.

For the salad I used

• salad greens of rocket and thinly sliced iceberg and endive
• bean sprouts minus their heads
• julienned sliced mango - Mexican ones are fairly affordable at the moment
• coriander
• spring onions
• avocado sliced
• toasted sesame seeds and chopped peanuts
• BBq chicken thighs thinly sliced

For the lime and sesame dressing I used

• juice of 3 limes
• 2 tablespoons of palm sugar
• 1-2 tablespoons of fish sauce
• 1 tsp of finely grated ginger
• smidge of garlic
• 1 tablespoon of sesame oil

The quantities for the salad is up to you and the measurements for the dressing are as close to a guess as I can remember as I don't measure, but taste it until it's balanced and right for you.

Dress the greens with some of the dressing and gently toss before adding the mango and avocado, so you don't make it mushy, finish off with the chicken and the nuts add some more dressing and give it a final gentle toss with your fingers.

lemon chicken

I have never made lemon chicken before but I decided to yesterday as I had a big bag of Meyer lemons and some left over chicken thighs in the fridge.  I used Neil Perry's recipe from his book 'balance and harmony'.  Actually now that I am looking at it I didn't follow it exactly.
I will give you his recipe and then tell you what I did differently.

For this recipe you will need

• 300g chicken thighs cut into 1 cm slices - I cut mine bigger
• 1 egg lightly beaten - I used an extra egg yolk
• 1/4 tsp sea salt
• 2 tablespoons of cornflour
• vegetable oil for deep frying - I use my wok
• 2 lemons
• 3 tablespoons of sugar
• 3 tablespoons white vinegar - I used rice wine vinegar
• a pinch of Sichuan pepper - I didn't have any - I used chile powder and sesame seeds
• 2 spring onions

Put the chicken, egg and sea salt in a bowl, toss together and leave for 20 minutes.

Remove the chicken from the egg, allowing the excess to drip away, and toss in the cornflour until evenly coated.  I actually added the flour to the egg mixture and formed a batter (by accident).

Heat the oil in a wok or deep fryer until smoking (180C) and deep fry the chicken pieces until golden and cooked through, then drain on paper towel.  I shallow fried and turned them over.

For the sauce, finely grate the zest from half a lemon, then juice the whole lemon. Peel and fillet the other lemon.  Put the sugar, vinegar, 3 tablespoons water, lemon fillets, zest and juice in a small pot.  Stir over low heat until the sugar dissolves, then bring to the boil and remove form heat. Pour the sauce over the chicken and sprinkle with Sichuan pepper and spring onions to serve.  I added a little cornflour so the sauce was thicker.

These are really just glorified chicken nuggets that would go with any type of sauce.