Coconut-Lime Peanut Chicken

You might have noticed that one of our home cook contributors, Emily, has an affinity for coconut. No wait, affinity isn’t strong enough. Attraction? Obsession, maybe? Let’s just say, there’s some Single White Female style love going on there. She’s been espousing the virtues of coconut milk to me for a long time and I never listened. But when I found this recipe, I decided to give it a shot finally. And I’m glad I did. It was slightly spicy (I’d add more spice next time) and slightly peanutty. I do think that the name of this meal is a misnomer, because I didn’t taste coconut or lime. But the peanut part was excellent, and even my peanut butter hating husband enjoyed it. I found this recipe on Tasty Kitchen. 

Ingredients

½ cups peanut butter

½ cups light coconut milk

1 tbsp Thai red curry paste

1 tbsp lime juice

1 tbsp soy sauce

2 tbsp fish sauce

2 tsps toasted sesame oil

½ tsp honey

1 pinch black pepper

1 pinch cayenne pepper

1 pinch cinnamon

For the Chicken:

1 teaspoon coconut oil (or oil of your choice)

½ cups onion, diced

3 cloves garlic, minced

1.5 pounds chicken breast

Whisk together all the ingredients for the sauce in a bowl. Taste a little and decide if you want more spice or more peanutty flavor and adjust it to fit your tastes. Set it aside and start on the chicken. Heat your oil over medium high heat. I didn’t use coconut oil, since I didn’t have it and didn’t want to get a whole thing of it just for this. I used olive oil and it worked just fine. Add your onion to the pan and cook just until soften, about 4-5 minutes. Add in your garlic and make sure it doesn’t burn. Just cook about 30 seconds or so and then add the chicken and cook for about ten more minutes until it browns and is cooked through. Then you just pour the sauce over the whole shebang and let it simmer, partially covered, for about 5 minutes.

The original recipe called for asparagus, but it didn’t seem to work for me so I left it out (although I love asparagus!). Broccoli might work better, or definitely some traditional Chinese additions like water chestnuts or bamboo shoots. Add those at the same time as the sauce. I also thought it would be good with some actual peanuts, kind of like Kung Pao chicken. Serve over rice and garnish with sliced green onion. It may not appease the coconut-obsessed but it made me consider that coconut milk might not be all that bad. Enjoy!

(click here for printable recipe)