The flavors of New Orleans & Cajun inspired chicken in a spiced cream sauce

I’ve been in love with New Orleans for years! I’ve never been and hope to someday. The colorful culture & mix of ethnicity’s intrigues me. The music; amazing jazz wows me! The food…ooooh the food…unique, tasteful with the influences of the French, the Spanish, the Creole & the Caribbean, its simply amazing! Thick sauces, jambalaya’s, étouffées and fresh seafood…yum! I have to admit that I am no real expert on the differences & uniqueness of Cajun vs Creole cooking however both are extremely delicious which is all that matters! Key cajun ingredients are the cajun vegetables (called the “Holy Trinity” of cajun cooking :-), cajun spices & the roux, each imparting a lovely taste to you dish.

This chicken inspired dish gets its name from the cajun spices fried off with the chicken to give a wonderful

Re-discovering “my” food & Keshk Frakh (Chicken Keshk)

Egyptian traditional; creamy savory “eggless-custard” with shredded chicken & crisp fried onions.

It’s funny…I never used to cook a lot of traditional food before I started this blog. Somehow now, I seem to be doing that more & more often.

Fast food and a thai inspired chicken curry

Hubby is away travelling and I’ve been handling all the errands this week. The result is I’ve been ordering in for dinner 😦
While I do actually enjoy fast food, it’s heavy and it’s a drain on the wallet too.

Yesterday, coming home after my son’s play day, I was dead hungry! Call up delivery again? I felt sick to my stomach and honestly I was too hungry to wait for 45min!

And then it hit me, I could probably make a delicious dinner quicker than what it would take to order & wait for a pizza or KFC! & that’s exactly what I did! Stormed into the kitchen and made a curry!

In a fix, I guess most of us think fast food is the quicker option when really most simple pasta dishes and a curry like this one take less time and are much, much better in both taste and nutrition. So think about that the next time you’re in a hurry and want to order in 🙂

The steamed rice and thai inspired chicken curry took exactly 30min to make from scratch. Well almost scratch, I had a tub of ready made green curry paste in the fridge. That’s the only short cut!

And if you follow the shesimmers blog or Kasma Loha-unchits site you’ll understand that ready made shop bought curry paste is completely acceptable if you can’t source all the right ingredients to make your own paste! In Cairo that’s impossible anyway!

We don’t have fresh shallots or galangal or kaffir lime leaves for example. Gourmet sells dried galangal and kaffir lime leaves but expensive and dried, not fresh 😦

And when I do make my own paste, I rely on produce that my husband gets me when he’s travelling and I freeze them until ready to make a batch.

Maybe there’s a hidden thai store somewhere in Maadi, but I have yet to find it! So until we do have a real Asian grocery store here in Cairo, shop bought is perfect!

Quick & easy Thai inspired chicken curry

Cheers!

Falling off the food wagon & the Sweet & Sour Chicken comeback!

Well it was Xmas and New Year and Mooled Elnaby…an all round season, right?

Indulge and splurge in gorgeous food. You’ll know what I mean if you’ve seen my previous posts! Between the roast rib and roast potatoes, trifles & tiramisu’s, the seafood fests of Alex and, Mooled Elnaby sweets and treats, small portions and calorie counting really took a back seat!

But now we’re back in the normal world and I need to get cracking on with still tasty yet calorie friendly dinners.

Which brings me to Asian cuisine…I just love Chinese and Asian food. The flavors are complex, the dishes are beautiful and a lot of recipes are quite easy to make. Sweet & Sour Chicken happens to be one of them !

One of my favourite quick and easy dinners, and way way way more tasty than any Chinese takeaway here in Cairo! I mean unless you’re going to a really authentic and expensive Chinese restaurant, there really isn’t any comparison!

Added bonus to several of the Chinese and asian meals is they will usually contain vegetables, hence healthy (healthier!), and I found that I can cut down on the fat content without impacting on the flavor.

This recipe is adapted from my favourite Asian recipe site and that is Rasa Malaysia! Her recipes are great!

The main difference is that mine doesn’t have the fried battered chicken. I sauté the chicken until browned lightly on the outside yet half cooked on the inside. It’s lighter than the original version yet still tasty.
I also add ginger along with the garlic as I love it’s taste. The final change is in the sauce quantity and proportions, I like a bit more sauce and more sour. You can find the original recipe here.

Calorie wise it’s great too!

The nutrition data below is for 1 serving (the recipe makes 3) plus 140gms steamed basmati rice.

Nutrition Data Per Serving
Calories (kcal) 655
Protein (g) 53.0
Carbohydrate (g) 77.8
Fat (g) 14.7
Fibre (g) 2.8
Fruit & Veg 1.6

So check out the recipe and I hope you enjoy!

Sweet & Sour Chicken

Cheers!