Chicken and Andouille Gumbo

Ingredients

• 1 head cauliflower
• 4 T butter, cubed
• s&p
• 3 leeks*
• 3 celery stalks
• 1 green pepper
• 1 lb. Andouille sausage, chopped
• 1 lb. boneless, skinless chicken thighs, chopped
• 6 c shrimp stock** (any stock will work)
• 1/2 lb. okra
• 1 14.5 oz. can diced fire roasted tomatoes
• 2 T Old Bay
• 2 t Quatre épices***
• 3 green onions

Method

Get your oven to 450°F. The food processor is going to be your BFF for this recipe. Get it out! Cut out the core and leaves of the cauliflower. Roughly chop and, in batches, process the cauliflower until it resembles rice. Place on a baking sheet. Toss it around with the butter and some s&p. Roast the cauliflower rice until it’s a nice pale yellow-ish color and doesn’t taste cauliflower-y, making sure to toss it one or two times while it’s roasting. About 25 minutes.

While the cauliflower is going, add the andouille sausage to a soup/stock pot, at least 5 quarts. Saute until it’s browned, remove from the pan and place on a “holding” plate. Add the chicken and saute until it’s done…if you’re a little shy of done, no worries, it’ll continue to cook in the soup. Remove the chicken and add to the plate with the sausage.

Add the green pepper, celery stalks and leeks to the food processor and blend until everybody is in small, itty-bitty pieces. Add to the stock pot and saute until everybody has softened. Pulse up the canned tomatoes in the food processor too–I don’t like when they’re too big in the soup, I like them evenly sized and textured within the soup. Add the rest of the ingredients, including the sausage and chicken, and simmer until the okra has softened, about 20 minutes. Don’t be afraid to taste the okra for the correct done-ness–soft, but still has a crunch to it.

To serve, place a scoop of cauliflower rice in the center of a bowl, ladle around the gumbo and sprinkle with green onions. You will have more gumbo than cauliflower. So leftovers will be “soup.”

*Leeks are dirty little suckers. To clean them: Cut off the root and to the top where it starts to get really, really green. Slice lengthwise and toss into a bowl of water. Use your hands to jiggle them around and that should remove virtually all the dirt.

**So here’s the deal with shrimp stock: I made the faux-viche one night and used shell-on shrimp. I saved the shells, added them to 3 quarts of water, simmered for 3 hours, strained and discarded the shells. Incredibly easily, and might I add, very resourceful.

*** Quatre épices is a french seasoning mix: white pepper, nutmeg, ginger, cloves. It’s not a necessary component, but it’s a nice addition. I found mine at World Market.

African Style Chicken Salad

Ingredients

• 1 lb. chicken breasts, sliced in 1/2 width wise and pounded thin with a meat mallet
• about 3 oz. arugula*
• 1/3 c oil cured olives, pitted**
• 3 oranges supremed (keep the zest for the dressing)***

Dressing Ingredients

• 1/3 c avocado or olive oil
• 1/3 c orange juice
• 1/3 c roasted red peppers
• zest of 2 oranges
• 1 t chili garlic sauce
• 1 t each cumin, coriander, paprika
• s&p

Method

Heat some fat in a saute pan on the high side of medium-high. These chicken breasts cook wickedly fast because they’re so thin. To get a good sear, cook the chicken until it’s about 3/4s of the way there on one side. You’ll see the sides of the chicken turn from pink to white. Flip it over and sear for a quick minute–very, very short amount of time here.

For the dressing:

In a food processor or blender, blend all the ingredients until emulsified.

To serve:

In a bowl, mix the dressing with the arugula, olives and orange supremes. Place the chicken on a plate and top with the salad. Why not put the chicken on top of the salad, you ask? Because you have to knife-and-fork this sucker. Why not have the chicken lying on a hard surface, like a plate, instead of on top of a bunch of lettuce? It’s much easier to gobble up this way, I promise.

*If you can’t find/don’t like arugula, ANY lettuce will work. Romaine, Mixed Greens, Spinach….

**Oil cured olives are just cured in oil (duh) as opposed to brined. Same as above–if you can’t find/don’t like oil cured olives, Kalamata (Greek) olives will substitute well

***You do not have to do this, but it sure is purrrrty and it’s a technique that looks really fancy, but is actually quite simple. This is how you supreme an orange:

Please notice the knife in Ming’s hand–it’s ceramic. I’ve heard they’re super sharp but break easily. Anybody got one of these? Also, Ming made a Paleo recipe, so write it down and make it too!

Country Captain

Ingredients

• 1 lb. boneless chicken thighs, skinless will work too
• 1 onion, diced
• 2 t garam masala
• 1 t curry powder
• 1/2 c raisins
• 2 t fresh ginger, minced
• 1 can coconut milk
• 1 lime, juiced

Method

In a skillet, melt some fat over medium-high heat. Salt and pepper the chicken thighs. Sear them on both sides until browned and cooked through. Remove from the pan and place on your serving platter.

Add the diced onion, garam masala, curry powder and ginger to the saute pan. Saute until the onions are tender. Add the coconut milk, raisins and lime juice. Simmer for a few minutes. Spoon the sauce over the chicken thighs.

Top with fresh cilantro and sliced almonds.

Also

You will probably have leftover sauce. Here’s an idea to use it up…

To the remainder of the sauce, add 2 cups of chicken stock. Ta-da, you’ve made a coconut curry soup. Add leftover pulled chicken thighs or roughly dice up a pound of chicken breasts and add to the soup. Let the soup simmer on medium heat until the chicken is cooked through.

Curried Chicken Salad

Ingredients

1 lb. boneless, skinless chicken breasts

1 lb. boneless, skinless chicken thighs

1 c avocado mayo*

2 t yellow curry powder

1 t garam masala**

1 1/2 c raisins

2 T mango chutney***

1 1/c c slivered almonds, toasted

handful of cilantro, roughly chopped

S&P

Method

Place the chicken on a baking sheet and bake until cooked through, about 25 minutes on 350ºF.

While the chicken is baking, take out a large bowl and  mix together the rest of the ingredients. Once the chicken is cool enough to handle, chop it into bite sized pieces and place into the large bowl. Mix to incorporate.

Serve cold.

*So here it is, drum roll please….

Avocado oil makes the perfect mayonnaise.

With most oils we’ve tried to make mayo with, the flavor is quite bitter or very, “POW! in your mouth.” Bacon mayo, tastes like bacon and coconut oil mayo tastes like coconut. Think about this way, I wouldn’t want coconut oil mayonnaise in my egg salad. The avocado mayo flavor isn’t bitter, but creamy and rich–quite buttery, really. The flavor is ideal to mix with almost anything. For the chicken salad, take this recipe and double it. We sourced the oil on Amazon.com. Please notice, you get 2 large bottles.

**Garam masala is an mixture cinnamon, ginger, cumin, coriander, nutmeg, etc. You can find it at at most grocery stores.

***Mango chutney, also sometimes called Major Grey’s Chutney, is a like a sweet and spicy mango jam. You can find it at most grocery stores, on the ethnic aisle.

Imagine eating a chili dog with slaw, onions and yellow mustard. Now imagine taking off the bun and eating it in a bowl with a fork and you’ve got the idea behind this recipe. Another way to look at it, we’ve taken off the sour cream, avocado and cheese from chili and added hot dog toppings.

Ingredients

Chili Ingredients

• 1 lb. ground meat* (I used ground chicken, but anything would work)
• 1 package hot dogs, chopped (I used sugar-free beef franks from U.S. Wellness Meats)
• 1 can Rotel tomatoes, juice drained, chopped small
• 1 c tomato sauce
• 2 chipolte peppers in adobe sauce, chopped finely
• 1 t garlic powder
• 1 t cumin powder

Slaw Ingredients

• 1 red cabbage, sliced thinly (The cabbage should quite small–weighing about 1 lb., you won’t need more than that)
• 1/2 c mayo
• 1/2 red onion, sliced
• 3 T pickled jalapenos, finely chopped**
• 5 T pickled jalapeno juice**
• 1 T yellow mustard

Method

In a medium sauce pan, cook the ground meat all the way through and then add the cut up hot dogs. Throw the rest of the ingredients in the pot and let it simmer while you make the slaw.

For the slaw, get out a large bowl and add all the ingredients, except the cabbage, and whisk to combine. Add the cabbage to the slaw base and mix to combine.

To serve, place the chili on the bottom of the bowl, then add some slaw and top with whatever hot dog fixings you like. Yellow mustard is an absolute must!

*If you’re pinching pennies, you can definitely leave out the ground meat and just use hot dogs. Chop the hot dogs rather small so they go further.

**Don’t be afraid of the pickled jalapenos or the juice. It’s not nearly as spicy as fresh jalapeno…but as always, add a little at a time and taste as you go–because you can’t take it away after you’ve added it.

Roasted Throw Together

Ingredients

• 1 lb. Italian (or any other flavor) sausage, casing removed, if link, and crumbled
• 2 onions, sliced
• 1 8oz. package mushrooms, halved
• 1 apple, chopped large

Method

Get your oven to 450ºF.

We’re going to build “layers” so that the fat from the sausage will seep down onto the other ingredients and there’s no need to add any additional fat. In a roasting pan, in this order, add: onions, mushrooms, apples and then the crumbled sausage. Place in the oven and roast until everything is softened, browned and cooked through–about 30 minutes. Make sure to mix things around about half way through.

Coconut Chicken Nuggets

Ingredients

• 1 lb. ground chicken
• 1 egg yolk
• 1 t onion powder
• 1/4 t garlic powder
• 1/4 c + 1/2 c almond flour
• 1/2 c dessicated coconut*
• 1/2 c coconut oil
• S&P

Method

In a bowl combine 1/4 c almond flour, 1/2 c dessicated coconut and some S&P. Mix it around with your hands. In a separate bowl, combine the ground chicken, 1/2 c almond flour, onion & garlic powders, egg yolk and some S&P. Mix it with your hands until everything has been incorporated.

In a saute pan, melt the coconut oil on medium heat.

Take about 2 tablespoons worth of the chicken mixture and in the palm of your left hand, roll it into a ball. Drop it into the almond/coconut mixture and roll the chicken ball around with the fingers on your left hand. Make sure it’s completely coated. Repeat with the rest of the chicken. Place in the saute pan and cook on each side until nice and brown. I did 3 batches for 1 pound of chicken.

I hate club hand. You know what I mean…think about fried chicken –whenever you dredge chicken in the liquid, then toss it in the flour, your fingers start to accumulate a mass of goop. This picture illustrates, what I was trying to type above, my method for keeping your hands club free.

*Dessicated coconut is dried, finely shredded, unsweetened meat of the coconut. It’s the perfect size to replicate a bread crumb. If you can’t find it at your natural foods grocery store, you can always order it from Amazon.

Curry Mustard Ingredients

• 1/3 c yellow mustard
• 1 T mayo
• yellow curry powder, to taste
• handful of cilantro, chopped
• squeeze of honey

Mix together and serve as a dipping sauce with the nuggets.