Thai Coconut Shrimp Soup, by Cheryl

Whew, what a busy summer! This is a delicious, healthy soup to have on a summer day! It was so tasty and light and I would definitely make it again. It didn't take long at all and makes enough for leftovers for a couple of days. Pair it with a nice white wine! Yum! 

Ingredients (from Paleo Running Momma)

1 tbsp olive or avocado oil

2 garlic cloves, minced

1 small onion, diced

1 tbsp fresh ginger, minced

1 tbsp minced lemongrass, inner part of one stalk

1 tbsp red curry paste

3 cups chicken broth

1 tbsp fish sauce

2 14 oz cans of full fat coconut milk

8 oz fresh shitake mushrooms, sliced

1 lb medium shrimp, peeled and deveined

zest of one lime grated

1 lime, juiced

Sea salt

Cilantro and/or scallions for garnish

Directions:

1) Heat the oil in a large stockpot over medium heat. Add the onion and cook until fragrant, then stir in the garlic, ginger, lemongrass, and curry paste, and cook for one minute. 

2) Pour the broth into the pot while stirring continually. Then stir in the fish sauce and simmer for 10 minutes. Pour in the coconut milk and stir, the add the mushrooms. Cook and stir until the mushrooms are soft, about 5 minutes. 

3) Add the shrimp and cook for about 5 minutes. Stir in the lime zest and juice. Season with salt to taste. Serve with cilantro, scallions, and/or lime wedges. 

Creamy Coconut Milk Meatballs, by Diane

 

My curry paste in my new mortar and pestle!

This recipe from @iheartumami looked promising, but in reality it fell flat. The meatballs are packed with aromatics and nutrition though, and the recipe allowed me to use my Thai red curry paste skills from a cooking class in Chiang Mai last year! Overall Cheryl’s Thai Coconut Curry Meatballs are way better, though I would fuse the two by adding the aromatics into her recipe for the meatballs!

Ingredients:

2 lb ground chicken

3/4 cup cilantro

2 small shallots

3/4 cup diced carrots

1/4 cup basil leaves

1/2 tsp ginger

3 tbsp fish sauce, divided 

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp cumin powder

2 tbsp coconut cream

14 oz full fat coconut milk

1 tbsp red curry paste

1 tbsp tomato paste

1/4 tsp ground coriander

1/4 tsp garam masala

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 410 and line a baking sheet w parchment paper.

2. Blend cilantro through ginger in a food processor until finely diced, then add to a bowl with chicken, 1 tbsp fish sauce, salt, cumin and coconut cream. Mix well and form into golf ball size meatballs.

3. Bake for 20 min, flip and bake another 10-15. 

4. While the meatballs cook, make the sauce in a saucepan over medium heat by adding remaining ingredients plus 2 tbsp fish sauce. Stir often.

5. Combine meatballs in sauce and stir for 2 minutes.

Spring Roll Bowls with Sweet Garlic Lime Sauce, by Diane AND Cheryl!

CHERYL AND DIANE ARE BACK TOGETHER IN THE KITCHEN!!!

Today, we got together for lunch and cooked this great recipe. It was filling, delicious, and pretty healthy! We both said we would make it again!

Ingredients:

3 cloves garlic

2 tablespoons rice vinegar

¼ cup agave or brown sugar

¼ cup fish sauce

⅓ cup lime juice

⅓ cup vegetable oil

Rice Noodles

Basil, Mint, and Cilantro

Serrano Peppers

Chopped Peanuts

1 avocado

1 red bell pepper

2 carrots, shredded

3 chicken breasts, cubed

Directions:

Pulse the first 6 ingredients plus 1/4 cup peanuts together in a blender or food processor.

Cook your rice noodles by soaking them in cold water for about 30 minutes. When they're softened, transfer to a pot of boiling water for just a minute or two before quickly draining again. 

Cook the chicken, put in a bowl.

Mince the herbs, slice the serranos, and peel or julienne cut the vegetables, and cook through.

Toss the noodles (hot or cold) with the sweet garlic lime sauce and all the other ingredients.

Thai Coconut Curry Meatballs, by Cheryl

Wow, this was good! The sauce had such a nice taste to it... I couldn't stop tasting it when it was cooking. This was pretty easy and quick to make and was a big hit, though it may have been a little too spicy for Julia. The original recipe didn't include breadcrumbs, but I just couldn't get the meatballs to form right without them, so I added them in. I would have liked the meatballs to be a little more tender, but they were still good. I served this over cauliflower rice for me and brown rice for Jon. Yum!

Ingredients (modified from original recipe):

1 lb ground beef or turkey
1 tsp curry powder
2 tsp ground basil
1/4 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/2 cup almond flour
1/2 cup bread crumbs
1 egg, beaten
1 tbsp coconut oil
1/2 medium onion, chopped
1/2 red pepper, chopped
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1 tbsp chopped fresh ginger
2 tbsp Thai red curry paste
1.5 cans coconut milk
1/3 cup chopped basil

Directions:

1) Preheat the oven to 375.

2) Mix the curry powder, basil, ginger, garlic powder, almond flour, and bread crumbs together in a bowl. Add in the meat and incorporate well. Finally, add in the egg and form meatballs. Place on large baking sheet and bake for 20 minutes.

3) While the meatballs are cooking, make the sauce. Heat a large skillet to medium high heat. Add coconut oil, onion, garlic, peppers, and ginger. Cook for 5-7 minutes. Add curry paste then all of the coconut milk. Simmer for 10 minutes until coconut paste is mixed into the sauce.

4) Add meatballs to the sauce and cook for an additional five minutes. Finish off with fresh basil.

Thai Crunch Salad with Peanut Dressing, by Diane

At our recent healthy potluck for work, a coworker brought this amazing salad recipe. It was an instant hit, and strangely addicting for a salad. I have eaten this salad for about 3 weeks straight since the party, and each time it is so good that I get to the bottom of the bowl before remembering that I need to take a photo of it for the blog! And, Cheryl and I know what happens when you take a photo at the very bottom of the bowl!!! The above photo is just about the 104th time I've eaten this salad since I made the draft of this blog entry, but I was finally successful in remembering to document it before diving in!

My favorite combo of ingredients in here include cabbage, radishes, carrots, green onions, cilantro, avocado, and green beans. But the original ingredients as posted below are really great (plus avocados!). It goes really well with chicken too! The dressing, which is the key to this addictive dish, would be amazing on just about anything so I'm going to experiment with uses for that as well!

Ingredients:
  
1/4 cup creamy peanut butter

2 tablespoons unseasoned rice vinegar
2 tablespoons fresh lime juice, from one lime
3 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 tablespoon soy sauce
2 tablespoons honey
2-1/2 tablespoons sugar
2 garlic cloves, roughly chopped
1-inch square piece fresh ginger, peeled and roughly chopped
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
2 tablespoons fresh cilantro leaves
4 cups chopped Napa cabbage, shredded red cabbage, or shredded coleslaw mix

1 cup prepared shredded carrots

1 red bell pepper, thinly sliced into bite-sized pieces
1 small English cucumber, halved lengthwise, seeded and thinly sliced
1 cup cooked and shelled edamame
2 medium scallions, thinly sliced
1/2 cup loosely packed chopped fresh cilantro

Directions:

1. For the dressing, combine all of the ingredients except for the cilantro in a blender and process until completely smooth. Add the cilantro and blend for a few seconds until the cilantro is finely chopped. Refrigerate until ready to serve.
2. For the salad, combine all of the ingredients in a large bowl and toss to combine. If serving right away, drizzle the peanut dressing over top and toss; otherwise, serve the dressing on the side so the salad doesn't get soggy.

Thai Green Curry with Shrimp, by Diane

I love Thai food, and there is a restaurant outside of my office that makes amazing green curry. My coworkers and I love to get it with shrimp, so when I saw this recipe in Rachael Ray Magazine I knew I had to give it a shot. It was surprisingly easy! I added in some other veggies to make it heartier like carrots, zucchini, and mushrooms. Overall this was quick, easy, and healthy and I would definitely make it again!


Ingredients:

1 red bell pepper, cut into strips
1 large shallot, chopped
2 tbsp Thai green curry paste
2 tbsp vegetable oil
1 lb. peeled deveined shrimp
1 14 oz. can coconut milk
5 oz. baby spinach
1 tbsp fish sauce
Optional: cooked rice, lime wedges


Directions:

1. Cook first 4 ingredients over medium heat, stirring often for 3 minutes.

2. Add the next 4 ingredients, stirring often for 4 minutes.

3. Serve with rice and lime wedges if desired.

Thai Fried (Cauliflower) "Rice", by Diane

In my search for recipes without grains, I have come across a lot of cauliflower "rice" recipes. Apparently, if you process raw cauliflower it cooks up and tastes just like rice, making it a great substitution. I was always skeptical of this until I had a delicious stew at my local favorite organic market last weekend and realized after I finished it that it had contained cauliflower and not rice as my friends and I had thought. The fact that we were all duped by this made me excited to get started on a recipe using this cool substitution!

One of the first recipes I came across is cauliflower fried rice. It seemed easy enough, but I wanted to steer clear from using exclusively soy sauce as chinese restaurants do (I'm trying to avoid soy, sodium, and gluten!) so I created a thai red curry sauce to pair with it instead. The end result- Thai Fried Cauliflower Rice- was SO good and tasted like it came from a restaurant! The best part, while it was filling and healthy, I would have never known it wasn't rice. I will say that the end result did have a hint of cauliflower taste, which was fine by me because I would have used it in this recipe anyway if it wasn't already the star ingredient. Definitely predicted to be on repeat across 2015!

One last note- the coconut oil really brought out the flavors of the sauteed ingredients even before adding the sauce in, you could definitely skip the sauce and be satisfied!!


Ingredients:

2 medium heads cauliflower
2 steam bags of oriental stir fry vegetables (or you can buy all the ingredients seperately, this is what I had on hand and worked perfectly!)
3 1/2 tbsp coconut oil
1 package baby bella mushrooms, sliced (any other kind works well too)
1/2 lemongrass stalk, sliced thinly
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 bunch scallions, sliced, green and white parts
1/2-1 whole jalepeno, seeds and ribs removed, sliced thinly
1 lb thin sliced chicken breasts
1 lime, cut in half
1 tsp ginger (in spice form)
Pink Himalayan sea salt and pepper
1 15 oz can lite coconut milk
4 tbsp red curry paste
1 tbsp brown sugar
2 tbsp chicken broth
6 eggs, whisked together
2 tbsp low sodium soy sauce

Directions:

1. Steam the bags of vegetables separately and set aside.

2. Chop cauliflower heads into large chunks, place in food processor in batches until it processes down to the size of rice grains. Place in a large bowl and set aside.

3. In a large saucepan heated on medium high, add 1.5 tbsp of coconut oil and heat until melted. Add mushrooms, lemongrass, garlic, scallions, jalepeno, and steamed veggies. Cook until the mushrooms have softened. Place in a very large bowl and set aside.

4. In the same saucepan, add 1.5 tbsp of coconut oil and the cauliflower rice. Cover and steam, occasionally stirring until all the rice is cooked and softened. Add to the bowl with the veggie mixture and set aside.

5. Sprinkle the chicken breasts on one side with lime juice from 1/4 lime, 1/4 tsp ginger, salt and pepper. In the same saucepan, add remaining 1/2 tbsp coconut oil and heat until very hot. Add in chicken breasts, making sure there is enough room (you'll likely need to do 2 batches) and placing the chicken seasoned side down. Season the top side and flip over until cooked through and browned. Remove from pan and set aside.

6. In the same saucepan, add coconut milk, red curry paste, and brown sugar, whisking together until combined. Add in remaining 1/2 tsp ginger and salt to taste. Bring heat to low and simmer for 5 minutes. Meanwhile, slice the chicken thinly and add it back into the pan with the sauce. Combine sauce and chicken with veggie mixture.

7. In the same saucepan, add chicken broth and eggs and scramble until you have fluffy eggs. Make sure to dice them finely with the spatula while they are cooking.

8. Add the eggs and soy sauce to the rest of the ingredients and toss together. Adjust seasonings to taste.

Thai Chicken Patties 2.0, by Diane

I made the original Thai Chicken Patties last week, and they were amazing in flavor but I didn't like the cooking process which made them crumbly and unevenly browned. I also was toting my sweet chili sauce to and from work, then dipping the patties in the sauce which made them crumble even more.

So, I created an alternate cooking style for these patties. They are baked instead of pan fried (i.e. healthier and less work) and they are coated with sweet chili sauce like a meatloaf would be. This way, they stayed solid and evenly browned and were coated with a thick glaze of the chili sauce. In short, I didn't think these little heavenly patties could get any better- but they just did. Boom.


Ingredients:

1 lb ground chicken breast
1 small zucchini, peeled and finely grated (makes about 1/2 cup, packed)
1 inch ginger, peeled and grated
1 egg
1 tbsp packed fresh cilantro, chopped
1 tsp lime rinds, finely minced (about 1/4 medium lime)
the juice of 1/2 lime
2 tsp fish sauce
2 scallions stalks, green and white, finely chopped
Salt
1/2 cup sweet chili sauce

Directions:

1.  Preheat the oven to 350.
2. In a large bowl, combine all ingredients except the sweet chili sauce.
3. Form 3-4-inch wide patties (you'll get about 4). The mixture will be very liquidy but it will not crumble. Place on a baking sheet sprayed with cooking spray evenly spaced out.
4. Bake the patties for 20 minutes. Flip, coat with sweet chili sauce, and cook for another 20 minutes or until they are done in the center.

Thai Chicken Patties, by Diane

This week I found a recipe for Thai Chicken Patties, which incorporates chicken and thai flavors without any bread. Overall, these made a good filling lunch that was packed with flavor. I would definitely make these again!

The recipe stated that the patties would hold together despite the lack of bread crumbs and being very runny. My first batch (on the right) fell apart when flipped, so on my second batch (left) I squeezed out all the liquid forming a tight patty and they turned out much better. I also found it hard to brown the patties as shown on the blog photo, but I think they turned out nicely anyway. I incorporated grated ginger into these and it was really good, so I'm including that in the ingredients. Finally, the recipe also shows a link to homemade chili sauce. This was a disaster for me- so luckily I had the store bought version on hand!


Recipe from: http://notenoughcinnamon.com/2014/08/06/thai-chicken-patties-with-sweet-chili-sauce/


Ingredients:

1 lb ground chicken breast
1 small zucchini, peeled and finely grated (makes about 1/2 cup, packed)
1 inch ginger, peeled and grated
1 egg
1 tbsp packed fresh cilantro, chopped
1 tsp lime rinds, finely minced (about 1/4 medium lime)
the juice of 1/2 lime
2 tsp fish sauce
2 scallions stalks, green and white, finely chopped
Salt
2 tsp olive oil (more if needed)
1/2 cup sweet chili sauce

Directions:

1. In a large bowl, combine ground chicken, grated zucchini, egg, cilantro, lime rind and juice, fish sauce and scallion. Season lightly with salt.
2. Form 2 to 2.5 inch wide patties (you'll get about 8). The mixture will be quite runny so you will need to squeeze as much liquid as possible from the patties so they do not crumble!
3. Heat olive oil in a non-stick skillet over high heat. When hot, add about 4 patties, making sure you don't overcrowd the skillet. Reduce heat to medium-low and cook for 5 minutes. Flip patties and cook for another 5 minutes. You want to cook them gently, so they are brown on the outside and cooked all the way through inside. Repeat with remaining patties, adding olive oil if needed. Serve them warm or cold with sweet chili sauce.