My spin on Sheet Pan Dinner- Cilantro Lime Chicken

I spent the whole winter counting the days til the warm spring sun shines down on me and I can start thinking about growing fresh herbs again. I've weeks flipping through garden catalogs and seed flyers and anxiously awaiting the springtime. This is our first summer in the city house and once again I be able to fine beautiful fresh herbs. I didn't plant a garden this spring, but with an abundance of farmers markets and specialty grocery stores I will have so many options. I plan to really embrace cilantro. Cilantro is the Either Or Plant- you either love it or you hate it. I used to detest the stuff and gagged any time I detected even a hint of it in my salsa. I decided to make an honest attempt to embrace it, and I sure have, falling in love the the flowery herby essence and bright flavor that's so unique.

All those fresh herbs mean I will have lots of great new flavors to play with. Cilantro is just inviting me to go in a Latin direction. Cilantro and lime are perfect partners, and juicy chicken is the perfect protein to showcase those flavors. While you can opt for chicken breasts, which work great in this recipe, chicken thighs are where the flavor is. Be sure to buy bone-in chicken thighs. This marinade is perfect for all kinds of chicken, so if you prefer a big platter of chicken legs, go for it. It's not too shabby for a wing recipe either. I opted to brown my chicken in that trusty cast iron beauty I have and finish as a "sheet pan dinner" but you can roast it right in the skillet and skip the vegetables or grill this chicken too.  

Juicy Cilantro Lime Chicken 

6 skin on, bone in chicken thighs (I used leg quarters, cut up, so 3 legs and 3 thighs)

1/4 cup olive oil, plus more

3 tablespoons lime juice

zest of one lime

4 cloves garlic, finely minced

1/4 cup minced cilantro (stems and leaves)

1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper

salt and pepper
baby Yukon Gold potatoes (about 4 cups)
1 medium onion
2 red or orange bell peppers

Rinse the chicken and pat dry with paper towel. Place in a large zip top bag along with all the other ingredients. Seal the bag and massage to mix ingredients and coat the chicken. Allow the chicken to marinate 3-4 hours (you can go overnight in the fridge too).

Heat the oven to 375 degrees. Using a heavy oven safe skillet, such as cast iron, heat the skillet over medium high heat. Add a small amount of cooking oil and place the chicken, skin side down, in the hot pan. Allow the skin side to brown well, then flip the chicken and brown the other side. 

While the chicken is browning, prepare your veggies. Cut the potatoes in half, cut the onion into wedges and cut the peppers into chunks. Toss veggies with a little olive oil and salt and pepper.

Line a baking sheet with foil. Spread the veggies evenly onto the foil. Top with the chicken. Spoon the pan juices over. Bake until chicken tests done, 45 minutes to an hour, and the skin is golden brown.

Garnish with additional lime slices for squeezing and sprinkle with additional chopped cilantro.

Choosing the chicken for this dish is important. A lot of people think they don't like chicken on the bone. You have to get past that thinking guys. Bone in and skin on chicken is by far more flavorful and juicy than a boneless skinless breast can ever hope to be. Plus, you don't get the gorgeous browning and flavor building that you do with skin on chicken. Face your fears and buy the bone in chicken. You won't regret it.

We didn't intend to eat healthy. Sometimes it just happens.

Ever get excited when you find a recipe that uses a vegetable you actually grew and really bought the plant just because and even though you know you will use them, you don't really have anything planned? Ya, me neither. Are you kidding! Of course I do!  If you remember a couple of summers ago I grew kale for the first time and well....... I was just a little over the top silly about it. Guess what? This recipe also has kale in it- and poblano peppers!! 

Our weeknight dinner was accidentally healthy- swai fillets
baked with lemon and herbs and this healthy quinoa kale toss.

I found the original recipe on a food blog called Eat Drink Garden With Valerie and immediately thought it fit perfectly in my quest to use up some of my quinoa stockpile and get lots of fresh veggies into my lunch. This salad has a Latin flair with the poblanos, black beans, cilantro tossed in a cumin lime dressing. Valerie used feta cheese in her recipe but I decided to pass on the cheese.

Have you ever used poblano peppers in a salad? I think most people use them in Mexican recipes, but I am always looking for something different. Of course I was minding my own business looking for cherry tomato plants at the garden center one day when the poblano plant fell into my cart *wink wink* I might as well get it since it ended up there, right?  Poblano peppers really are a great choice for experimenting with chilies. They aren't hot, I like to call them "warm" and they have such a nice pepper flavor. Roasting them makes it incredibly easy to get the skin off and adds a smoky hint. You can roast peppers on a grill or under your broiler. Need help? Click HERE to read about roasting Hatch chilies- use the same method. Hmm, speaking of Hatch chilies, those would be awesome in this dish too.

Black beans are a pantry staple at our house. They show up in all kinds of dishes here and salads are perfect for beans. So are nachos, but I'm trying to be healthy for a day.

Quinoa Salad with Black Beans and Kale

adapted from Eat Drink Garden With Valerie

1 cup quinoa

2 cups water

1 teaspoon kosher salt

4 poblano peppers, roasted, peeled and diced**

1 3/4 cups cooked black beans, rinsed

1/4 cup cilantro leaves

2 cups baby kale, lightly packed*

1/4 cup Lemon Herb Dressing, plus more for serving (recipe follows)

* You can use any salad green you like if you don't have baby kale. Radish greens, arugula, tatsoi are all great choices. If you have regular kale, tear it into bite sized pieces. I used a package of Kalettes, chopped coarsely.

** I didn't have any poblanos, sadly, so I used a green bell pepper. It was good, and I think next time I'll use a mix of colors of bell peppers. I didn't roast the pepper and really liked the fresh crunch.

In a dry saucepan, toast the quinoa for about 5 minutes over medium heat, until golden brown. Add the water and turn up the heat. Bring the quinoa to a boil, then reduce heat and cover. Cook for 15 minutes, then remove from heat and let rest 5 minutes. Fluff with a fork, and then spread it out onto a lightly oiled sheet pan to cool.

Roast the peppers, then remove the charred skins, stems, seeds and membranes and dice. I just used a fresh unroasted bell pepper so if you go with that too just dice it up. Chop the kale into nice bite sized pieces. Roughly chop the cilantro.

Toss the quinoa, peppers, beans, cilantro and kale in a large bowl with the dressing. Add the cheese and toss again. Serve!

Lemon Herb Dressing

1/4 cup lemon juice

1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar

1/3 cup olive oil
salt and pepper
1 teaspoon lemon garlic seasoning (I used Trinidad from Penzey's)
2 teaspoons herb seasoning of your choice (I used Feiny's Everything)

Combine everything in a bowl or jar. Whisk or shake to combine. 

I'm a big zest lover, since it has so much flavor, so I added some lemon zest and tossed that in the dressing too. 

I really love kale in this salad because it's a sturdy green and doesn't get wilty and gross. I love the flavor of kale too. I often grow baby Russian kale or mixed baby kales and they are perfect in salads like this. I love this dressing with lime too. So bright and flavorful. Salads like this make perfect lunches too- just pack a couple bowls ahead of time and tuck in the fridge. No last minute fuss in the morning. We had our salad served alongside some delicious and very healthy baked swai fillets, drizzled with lemon juice and sprinkled with herbs. Lots of healthy protein, lots of fiber and virtually no fat except for the olive oil in the dressing.

The best thing about having a garden is being able to grow vegetables I can't always get at the store, and I get to try a lot of different veggies as well. Here in Des Moines we are lucky to have some of the best farmers markets anywhere and the selection of fresh produce is fantastic. Since this will be my first farmers market season back in the city you can bet I'll be going crazy with all the fresh produce!

Meatless Monday meets Taco Tuesday

Every now and then we like to throw a vegetarian meal into our rotation. We get to be creative with food and it doesn't hurt to give up meat every once in a while. In fact, lots of vegetables and other foods  make great protein replacements and can be just as hearty as a piece of steak or chicken.

When it comes to bulking up a meal when we're not eating meat, we love mushrooms. The modern grocery store has so much variety these days that the produce section often has four or more different fresh mushrooms at any time. We have the usual suspects- button mushrooms and portobello mushrooms, but we also see cremini, porcini, shiitake, oyster and others. When you consider the variety of dried mushrooms too, wow, you can really have fun with textures and flavors.

I didn't want just boring old button mushrooms. A while back I was sent a package of mushrooms and peppers from Marx Foods to try, cook with and share what I thought, so the chanterelles and black trumpet mushrooms are going on the tacos. They were big and great quality, rehydrated easily and cooked perfectly. They added a nice woodsy flavor to the tacos.

Today we're talking tacos. Now your mind probably immediately went to the old boring Americanized taco- a blah tortilla with greasy spiced hamburger, shredded processed cheese, wilted lettuce and, often, leaky old sad tomatoes. Trust me people, it isn't like this in Mexico. At all. I'm not claiming my mushroom tacos are authentic either, but they are a nice change with lots of flavor, none of the grease, none of the gross fake cheese.

I had to use dehydrated mushrooms for my wild mushrooms.
These mushrooms are from Marx Foods. 

Lakehouse Mushroom Soft Tacos

1 1/2 lbs mixed fresh mushrooms

1 large sweet onion

1/4 cup olive oil

3 tablespoons lime juice

1 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons cumin

1 garlic clove, smashed/bruised

1 14.5 ounce can fire-roasted diced tomatoes

1/4 cup finely chopped fresh cilantro, divided
2-3 tablespoons adobo sauce

1 cup sour cream, divided

diced avocado, sliced radish, cilantro leaves, etc.

whole wheat soft tortillas

Divide the sour cream into two small bowls. Add 2 tablespoons cilantro to one bowl, and the adobo sauce to the other. Cover and chill.

Clean the mushrooms and slice. If using shiitakes, pull off and discard the stems; if using portobellos (the big ones), scrape the gills off with a spoon- an optional step but it helps the dish not be so brown. I used white button mushrooms, rehydrated chanterelles and black trumpet mushrooms.

Clean the onion and slice into thin wedges. Use the flat side of a knife to smash and bruise the garlic clove without chopping it up. We want the garlic flavor but we will be discarding it later.

Place the vegetables in a large zip top plastic bag.

Combine the oil, lime juice, salt, cumin and mix well. Pour over the vegetables in the bag. Close the bag and pop in the fridge for about an hour.

Preheat the broiler. Remove vegetables from bag and drain off marinade. Discard the garlic clove. Spread the vegetables on a baking sheet and broil for about 10 minutes, stirring once halfway through cooking time, until mushrooms are nicely browned.

Drain the tomatoes and toss with mushrooms and onions. Pop back in the oven for a few seconds to heat the tomatoes. 

Serve the vegetables in soft whole wheat tortillas drizzled with the cilantro crema, adobo crema, crumbled queso fresco and whatever toppings you like.

Tonight we topped ours with cilantro leaves, shredded radish
greens, sliced scallions, sliced radish and queso fresco.

The mushrooms and tomato mixture is also good served over shredded lettuce as a mushroom taco salad with avocados and the cilantro cream. You can add salsa if you like- I like mixing salsa and the sour cream in equal parts and using that as a dressing for taco salad. 

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received one or more of the products or services mentioned above for free in the hope that I would mention it on my blog. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I believe are of good quality and safe. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising."