Directions
Christmas vacation is over. What a bummer! It was a fantastic, much needed break for all of us in the Chew Nibble Nosh house. Tomorrow marks the beginning of a new semester of school, after-school activities, and our usual craziness. Plus, sadly, it also marks the start of when I need to start setting my alarm clock again. That’s always a rough one for me.
Oh, well. Let the busy begin!
If getting back in the groove is a tough one for you, it helps to have some recipes on hand that don’t require much thought. This is one of those recipes. It’s simple, and quick, and just happens to taste really good too! If I’m being honest, it was actually a lot better than I thought it would be. I made it that night because I had most everything on hand, and we were heading out-of-town for a few days. I’ll make it again because it was delicious.
I started by prepping all of my ingredients, as usual. This is a pretty quick stir fry, so it pays to be prepared. I got my sauce ingredients together. The sauce is simply some chicken broth, fish sauce, water, sugar, and rice vinegar.
My biggest piece of advice with the sauce? Don’t accidentally get fish sauce on your fingers, because then, your fingers will smell like fish sauce and that’s never good. I speak from experience.
After that, I sliced up my chicken.
I sliced each chicken breast across the grain, and then sliced those slices in half, to make for quick and easy stir frying.
I sliced up an onion, chopped up some garlic, minced some fresh ginger, chopped up a bit of fresh cilantro, and roughly chopped some salted cashews to finish things off. I also got three spicy dried chiles ready. If you really want to spice up the dish, cut the peppers in half. If you just want some moderate heat, leave them whole.
Once it was prepped, we were ready to roll. The prep time takes longer than the cook time!
I quickly stir-fried my chicken in a bit of oil on the stove top Once that was done, I removed the chicken from the hot pan, added a little more oil, and threw in my onion, garlic, and ginger.
After that stir fried for about 30 seconds, I stirred in some curry powder and those dried chiles.
Once that was fragrant, I poured in my sauce and added my chicken back into the pan.
I let it simmer together for about one minute longer, just to make sure that chicken was cooked through, and then I stirred in my cashews.
That’s it!
I served it over Jasmine rice with a sprinkle of the chopped cilantro on top.
What a simple, delicious way to kick off another sure-to-be-crazy year.
QUICK CURRIED CHICKEN WITH CASHEWS
Adapted from Cooking Light
- Sauce
- 1/3 cup fat-free chicken broth
- 3 Tbsp. water
- 1 1/2 Tbsp. fish sauce
- 1 tsp. sugar
- 1 tsp. rice vinegar
- For the chicken:
- 3/4 lb. boneless, skinless chicken breast
- 2 Tbsp. canola oil, divided
- 1 1/2 cups vertically sliced onion
- 1 Tbsp. minced peeled fresh ginger
- 1 Tbsp. minced garlic
- 1 tsp. Madras curry powder
- 3 small dried hot red chiles, broken in half if you want
- 1/3 cup chopped fresh cilantro
- 1/4 cup salted dry roasted cashews, roughly chopped
- 3 cups hot cooked rice
- To prepare the sauce, combine the first 5 ingredients in a small bowl and set aside.
- Cut the chicken breasts across the grain into 1/4 inch slices. Cut the slices into 1/2 inch wide strips. Cut the strips into 3 inch long pieces.
- Heat 1 Tbsp. of the oil in a 14 inch wok or large skillet over high heat. Add half of the chicken strips to the pan, and stir fry for 2 minutes. Remove the cooked chicken from the pan and place in a bowl to the side. Repeat the procedure with the remaining chicken and 2 teaspoons of the oil.
- Add the remaining 1 teaspoon of oil to the pan, swirling to coat.
- Add the onion, ginger and garlic to the pan and stir-fry for 1 minute, or until lightly brown. Add the curry powder and chiles, and stir-fry for 30 seconds.
- Add the sauce and the chicken to the pan, and stir-fry for 1 minute.
- Stir in the cashews.
- Serve over rice, and sprinkle with cilantro.
