Chicken and Butternut Salad

 

 

I’m chilling in the coffee shop/restaurant Ginger and Fig, in Pretoria. I’ve just hooked up to the wi-fi and the password code is the funniest I’ve heard in a while. The story of Ginger and Fig is a very cool one. Although the owner (he is a ginger) does not fit the profile of the story. He looks very much like Lucas Parker of Crossfit fame, and someone not to F#$* with.

The food is very good, lovely ambiance and the coffee is at this date my favourite in Pretoria, eclipsing Haloa, Vintage coffee and Lucky bread by the fairest of margins. They use Doubleshot coffee beans which is locally roasted in Braamfontein, Johannesburg, #supportlocal. I would certainly recommend this place for an all-round experience.    

There is so much I’ve wanted to share but the time and my own personal laziness have prevented the outpouring of my knowledge. This recipe was born out of items that I had in my freezer but not particularly fond of. The chief culprit, chicken fillet. Why oh! why did we buy chicken fillet. All the best proponents of the chicken have been removed, bones, skin etc. It’s like a laboratory generated meat with a propensity to not cook properly. The weirdest thing is that we pay more for it. Rant aside I hope to have worked out a recipe using one of my disliked ingredients with another childhood phobic word, i.e. SALAD.

The recipe also uses an air fryer (marketing beguilement of note), to complete a trifecta of pet hates. Last rant-tjie (synonym in English/Afrikaans for small rant) I promise………for now. On to the recipe!

Ingredients

·         Chicken fillets (250g), cut into cubes

·         1 tsp chilli flakes

·         1 tsp freshly ground pepper

·         1 “medium” butternut, cut into blocks (apologies for the term medium, I do not even know how to describe the butternut size used)

·         1 green pepper

·         3 Tbsp Olive Oil

·         1 small red onion (cut into cubes)

·         3 Tbsp Feta (crumpled)

Method

·         Mix chicken fillets, chilli flakes and pepper and place in air fryer for 13mins @ 220 deg C (ensure that the fillets are cooked)

·         Remove chicken and place in bowl

·         Add butternut to air fryer and cook for 15mins @ 220 deg C

·         Place green pepper and olive oil with chicken in bowl and mix around

·         After 15mins add onions and coconut oil to butternut and mix around, then place in air fryer for 20mins.

·         After 20mins, remove butternut and onion and combine with chicken.

·         Add Feta and serve…….Either hot or cold!!

Bon appetite!!

 

Aubergine, Pepper salad

I'm sitting at the airport at the moment and wondering how things have changed, how life has moved on and even what I enjoy has changed. The term salad used to evoke a sense of something you had to do in order to get to the good stuff or something that only herbivores would eat. It also evoked feelings of annoyance because it was coupled with diet and suffering and those crappy glomail adverts.

As I embarked on my life-style change, I started looking at some vegetables/fruit differently and after I went to Morocco and tasted some of the most amazing salads without a leaf in site. The other thing is that I also went through a stage where I could not eat any more meat, so I just felt like eating vegetables only.

I usually post pictures of some of my dishes on Instagram. My follower's on that platform would request a recipe to the salad. I found this request weird because you just put stuff together and voila salad! but I changed my thinking to realise this is like making any other dish and the salad is the end result.

This post is the start of a departure from the "main-course" type meals that I have been blogging so far. I do not have a step by step picture account but with a salad one picture is enough to convey the idea.

I hope you enjoy the directional change.

Ingredients
1 large aubergine
1 yellow bell pepper
1 Tbsp olive oil
1 Avocado
2 Tbsp feta
10cm long piece of cucumber
Pepper

Method
Dice aubergine and yellow bell pepper, mix with olive oil and place in air-fryer for 30mins
Turn/mix the aubergine/pepper once after 20mins in air-fryer
Remove aubergine/pepper and let cool (15mins)
Dice up avocado and cucumber and place on aubergine/pepper
Sprinkle feta
Grind some black pepper and add additional olive oil for taste

Enjoy!

Please give feedback if you tried and enjoyed the recipe.