Chicken Lettuce Wraps Salad

Taking a little break from the vegan recipe posts! We all loved this lettuce wrap recipe, I'm excited to try to make it vegetarian.  I think if I (you) subbed 1/2 a block of tofu chopped for the chicken and doubled or even tripled the mushrooms it would be a great vegetarian/vegan option!  

Turns out that it's kind of a pain to make lettuce wraps for a family of five, and then the dressing is dripping down everyone's arms so...we made it into a salad and loved it! I ate the rest the next day for lunch and had some of the sauce left over for a salad the following day.  I used a packet of lettuce wrap mix for the wrap filling, but I found the sauce recipe here.  So I guess you could call this a semi-homemade Chicken Lettuce Wraps Salad. It's yummy!

Chicken Lettuce Wraps Salad

1 1/2 lb ground chicken (I'm sure turkey would work fine)

8 oz mushrooms, chopped

2/3 c. chopped water chestnuts (I had fresh ones I peeled and chopped but a can works great)

1 bunch green onions, chopped

1 packet lettuce wraps seasoning packet (I used Sun Bird)

1 head iceberg or bibb lettucce

2-4 c. cooked brown or white rice for serving (depending on how much rice you like)

Mix the lettuce wrap packet together as directed and pour over the ground chicken.  Cover and put in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.  Heat a large skillet over medium heat and saute the chicken with the marinade, mushrooms, water chestnuts and green onions for 8-10 minutes or until the chicken is cooked through.  Then it's your choice to assemble lettuce wraps or a salad! To make wraps or salad layer lettuce, rice, chicken mixture and drizzle with sauce.

Lettuce Wrap Sauce

recipe from epicurious

1/4 c. sugar

1/2 c. water

2 Tb. soy sauce

2 Tb. rice vinegar

2 Tb. ketchup

1 Tb. lemon juice

drizzle of sesame oil

1 Tb. dijon or spicy mustard

1 tsp. sriracha (or more if you really like spicy)

2 cloves of garlic

Whisk all ingredients together and refrigerate.

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Kung Pao Chicken

This meal was very good and if you go to the Cooking Light page you can see their version is much prettier! I left out the peanuts because I like nuts, but not in my food and I didn't think my kids would go for it either. But if you like nuts...go for it!




Kung Pao Chicken

1 Tb sesame oil
1 Tb vegetable oil
1 c. chopped onion
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 pound chicken thighs, cut in 1-inch pieces
3/4 c. water
3 Tb soy sauce
2 tsp cornstarch
1 tsp brown sugar
1 tsp ginger, minced
1 tsp crushed red pepper
1 red bell pepper, thinly sliced
1 c. snow peas
2 Tb. chopped dry roasted peanuts

prepared rice

Before you begin cooking, in a small bowl combine 3/4 c. water, soy sauce, cornstarch, brown sugar, ginger, and crushed red pepper stirring with a wisk until sugar is dissolved. Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high.  Add onion to the pan; saute 3 minutes.  Add garlic and cook another 30 seconds.  Add chicken, saute 3 minutes or until chicken begins to brown.  Add water mixture to the pan and bring to a boil.  Add the bell pepper and snow peas, cook until vegetables are crisp=tender and the sauce thickens.  Sprinkle with nuts (optional.)  Serve over rice.

1/4 of this recipe is 275 calories, 13.8 g fat, 2.2 g fiber NOT including rice.

Cheater's General Tso Chicken

I saw an old friend this weekend and she said she was loving this blog but had noticed my blog-slacking.  It's true.  Life has been crazy around here which has adversely affected my blog updating. The upside to that is that I have still been cooking which means that I have a notebook full of recipes to post. This one's for you Brianne!

This may come as a shock, but I'm a sucker for a deal. So when the Sun-Bird Asian mixes were on sale aaaaand I had a coupon I had to get some.  I'm so happy I did.  This stuff is so good and I threw it together really fast and my son's comments (again) were, "Wow Mom, I love Pei Wei."  I love this because it's so quick it works well for an evening when we have something going on.

Cheater's General Tso Chicken

cooked rice
1 lb chicken thighs, chunked
1/4 c. flour
2 Tb vegetable oil
2 c. fresh broccoli, chopped
1 packet SunBird General Tso mix
2 Tb soy sauce
1/4 c. sugar (I used a bit less)
pinch of crushed red pepper (optional, we like spice)
1/2 c. water

While the rice is cooking chunk the chicken and toss it and the flour in a ziploc bag to coat.

In a bowl combine the seasoning mix, soy sauce, sugar, red pepper and water.  Whisk the sauce ingredients well and set aside.

Heat the oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat, add the chicken and saute until brown tossing in the broccoli for the last minute of cooking.  Lower heat to medium and pour in the sauce.  Bring the sauce to a boil and cook until thickened.  (If the sauce thickens too quickly pour in a little extra water.) Serve over steamed white or brown rice.

Pork Fried Rice

I found the basis of this recipe on allrecipes.com which I'm sure I've mentioned before.  I changed it a little bit but it was a great start!  You could easily adapt this recipe to add more vegetables, use brown rice or instant rice instead, substitute chicken or shrimp get creative!

Here's a little tip about sesame oil, it will go rancid quickly so store it in the fridge for long-term use.  This recipe also calls for fresh ginger.  I buy a piece of fresh ginger, peel it and then freeze it so that when I need it I can just cut or grate some off of it.

I like to cook the rice early and let it set a little while because it separates better and fries up well.  Or something like that.

Pork Fried Rice

2 c. cooked white rice
3/4 lb pork loin, diced
2/3 c. chopped carrot
2/3 c. frozen peas
1/2 onion, chopped
1 Tb fresh ginger, minced
2 garlic cloves, minced
2 Tb vegetable oil
2 eggs, beaten
3 Tb soy sauce (plus more for serving)
1-2 tsp sesame oil

In a saucepan cook rice as directed.  Once rice is cooked set aside until you're ready for it.  In a large skillet heat oil over medium or medium-high heat and cook the carrots for 2-3 minutes, add onion and pork and cook another 3 minutes stirring occasionally.  Add in peas, sesame oil, ginger, garlic and cook a minute.  Make a hole in the middle of the skillet and pour in the eggs stirring as they cook and combine with the vegetables.   Once the egg is cooked, stir in rice and sprinkle with soy sauce.  Combine well.  Serve with extra soy sauce.

Chicken Stir Fry

I love to make stir fry. If you have veggies around and not enough of one to be a side-dish, throw it all together and make a stir fry. This recipe is just a guideline so adjust with whatever vegetables you have on hand.  I think some asparagus, broccoli, zuchinni, snow peas and bok choy would be great additions or substitutions to this recipe.  You can always add more vegetables to stretch your meat out a little bit.

I had bought some Soyaki sauce at Trader Joes and I wanted to make something to put it on so I made this stir fry and put a soyaki/soy sauce combo on it and it was very good!  It's also super low in calories (depending on how much oil you cook the chicken and veggies in.)

A quick stiry-fry note: please do not overcook your vegetables.  It is so disappointing to chop up a bunch of fresh vegetables only to overcook them and be left with a bowl of mushy brown veggies.  I usually leave my a little crunchy so if they keep cooking a few minutes after I turn the heat off we're still good.

Chicken Stir-Fry

2 tsp oil
1 lb chicken breast or tenders OR thighs, thinly sliced (slice it while it's still frozen, so much easier)
salt, pepper, granulated garlic for seasoning
1 tsp sesame oil

2 tsp oil
1 bell pepper, thinly sliced (I used half a red and half a yellow)
1 onion, thinly sliced
2 carrots, sliced
1 large or 2 small yellow squash, sliced
2 cups (or more) cabbage, shredded
2 cups fresh spinach
3 garlic cloves, minced
2 tsp fresh ginger, grated or minced
salt & pepper

sauce of your choice
cooked rice

*Note: You really want to have all of your vegetables chopped and ready to go because the whole stir-fry process goes fast!

Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat and add olive oil.  When its hot add the chicken, seasoning well and drizzling with sesame oil.  Quickly cook the chicken and remove to a plate.  Add more olive oil and heat the pan to medium.  Saute the onion and carrots for a couple minutes then add in the bell pepper and cook a minute more.  Stir in the ginger and garlic, then add in the squash cooking for a minute more.  Season well with salt and pepper and then add in the cabbage cooking until it just starts to soften.  Stir in the spinach, turn off the heat and remove the pan from the burner.  Serve over rice with whatever sauce you like.

Apricot Pork (or Chicken)

This tastes SO much better than it looks.  Seriously.  We love this stuff, it's Asian-y tasting and I love that you can throw it together in two minutes in the morning, boil some rice and you  have dinner.  I use pork quite a bit with this recipe but chicken thighs or breasts are great too.

I found this recipe on the crockpot lady's blog.  I spent three whole days once last year reading her entire blog and looooove her ideas.  She's gluten free too so if you're looking for those kinds of recipes, s he has loads of them.


Apricot Chicken or Pork11 oz jar apricot jam
1 T. onion flakes
1 T dijon or spicy mustard
1 T. soy sauce
1/4 tsp. dried ginger
1/2 tsp. crushed red pepper
1 1/2 lb chicken or pork loin

Put the meat in the slow cooker and mix together the rest of the ingredients in a separate bowl.  Pour the sauce over the meat (frozen chicken is fine) and cook on low 6-8 hours or high 4-6 hours.

Mongolian Beef

This is SO good.  I mean, really really good.  Rob did the "What About Bob" interpretation at the table while eating it.  I will make this over and over again and I think it would be great with pork loin or chicken thighs or breast too.

I found this recipe here.  Before I had my third child I had plenty of time and energy to read food blogs at night and this is one I look at fro time to time.  Now, I think about reading food blogs and then go to bed.  I will do it again...hopefully. The only thing I changed from the original recipe is I made more sauce.  I like sauce.
Mongolian Beef

Sauce:
1 Tb vegetable oil
3/4 tsp ginger, grated
4 cloves garlic minced
3/4 c. soy sauce (regular or low-sodium depending on your preference.)
3/4 c. water
1 c. plus 2 Tb brown sugar
1 Tb corn starch

Beef:
Vegetable oil for frying (2-3 Tb will do it if you're watching calories, or more if you're not)
1 1/2 lb flank steak
1/4 c. cornstarch
4 green onions
1 lb mushrooms, quartered

cooked rice

For the sauce, heat the oil over medium-low in a medium sauce pan. Add in the garlic and ginger and cook for just a minute and then add in soy sauce, water and brown sugar.  Raise the heat to medium-high and bring to a boil, stirring continuously.  Let it boil 2-3 minutes.  Then, mix together 1 Tb. water and 1 Tb cornstarch together in a small bowl and stir it into the sauce.  It should thicken up quickly.  Turn off the heat and set the sauce aside.

Slice the flank steak into thin slices and dip them into the cornstarch.  Set aside.  Put 2 tsp vegetable oil in a frying pan or skillet and heat to medium.  Add in the mushrooms and saute a few minutes until they are getting brown and soft.  Remove the mushrooms and add 2-3 Tb more vegetable oil to the pan.  Cook steak over medium-high heat a minute or two on each side, until browned.  (It won't take long if it's cut thinly)  Remove steak to a paper towel-lined plate.  Wipe the skillet clean of the oil and add steak, mushrooms, green onions and sauce back into the pan and simmer a few minutes over medium heat.  Serve over rice.  YUM.

Thai Peanut Noodles

Yumm. I'm kind-of salivating looking at the picture of the noodles. Seriously my family of four ate this entire recipe. There was some sauce and a couple veggies and a stray piece of chicken left in the pan at the end of dinner. We ALL ate seconds, which is really saying something because my one year-old has begun eating like a bird. (Except Cheetos Puffcorn, she could eat an entire bag of that.)

My friend had given me a bottle of Pampered Chef's Thai Peanut sauce in a gift bag of goodies for my birthday and I hadn't used it yet. SO I used it in this recipe and I'm so glad there's some left because it's delish and I have enough left to make another batch of these noodles. Although, I compared ingredients with other bottles of peanut sauce in the asian aisle at the grocery store and I'm confident you can sub any bottled peanut stir-fry style sauce in this recipe. Or, get on Kristin's website and order some of this addictive peanut sauce from her.

This recipe includes siracha sauce. If you've never tried it--you're missing out. We LOVE this sauce, it's a hot sauce, but thicker andmade of chiles and garilc--super flavorful. You can find it at any grocer in the asian food aisle. I dip lots of stuff in it, my favorite thing is a hummus wrap dipped in Siracha. it keeps for a loooonnng time in the fridge.

Also, to help me with my sauce recipe I parused the Pioneer Woman's site and found a great sesame noodles recipe, and since she hasn't steered me wrong yet I used it as a starter for the sauce for this recipe.

Thai Peanut NoodlesPasta:
3/4 lb linguini, or long noodles of your choice cooked al dente
2 c. cooked chicken, cubed* (about 2 chicken breast halves)
2 tsp veg oil
1 red bell pepper, seeded and cut in strips
2 large carrots, peeled and sliced
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 Tb grated fresh ginger (or 1 tsp dried ginger powder)
1 bunch green onions, sliced
1/2 c chopped cilantro

Sauce:
1 c. bottled peanut sauce
1/4 c soy sauce
2 T sugar
2 T rice vinegar
3 T sesame oil
1 tsp siracha sauce (this stuff is delish, put it on everything!)
4 T vegetable oil
2 T water

Start with the sauce, mix all ingredients except the peanut sauce in a mixing bowl and whisk together well. Add in the peanut sauce and stir again. Set aside. Then, while the noodles are boiling heat 2 tsp oil in a skillet and saute the red pepper and carrots a few minutes until the begin to stoften, you don't want them mushy. Toss in the ginger and garlic and saute another minute. Add in the chicken and green onions and saute until warm through. Add in the cilantro. Toss the chicken/veggie mixture in with the drained noodles and toss with the sauce. Serve immediately. Yumm.

*I had cooked chicken on the grill the night before so I made a couple extra chicken breasts for this meal, which cut the time way down.