Chicken, Mango, Avo Salad with Lime

 

I saw this recipe on Pinterest and decided it was the winner for dinner one night last week.  However, we had an experience just a couple nights before with an orange juice dressing that overpowered the salad so I decided to not do the dressing.  And I added chicken ... If you want the orange dressing (that looks amazing) then go check out the original recipe.  If you want to try it my way, here's what I did.

1 bag of rocket (arugula) 
fresh coriander, a handful (?) or to taste ...
1 ripe mango
1 ripe avocado
1/2 a red onion
1 lime
1 red chilli
1 chicken breast
white wine vinegar
olive oil
salt and pepper

This was super easy.  Have your husband grill the chicken with a bit of salt and pepper, while you prepare the salad.  :) If that isn't an option, then just grill it yourself or throw it in the frying pan with a bit of olive oil and some white wine towards the end.

Thinly slice red onion and red chilli (I removed the seeds and membrane) Put in a small bowl, squeeze the lime into the bowl, add a pinch of salt.  Stir it up and set it aside.  

In a large salad bowl, add rocket (a few big handfuls, depending on how many you are serving) and fresh coriander that you have washed and roughly chopped.  Chop avocado and mango.  Add to rocket.  Pour red onion mixture on top and toss salad gently. 

Chop and add chicken. 

Drizzle lightly with a good olive oil and a nice white wine vinegar, sprinkle gently with a nice rock salt and cracked pepper.

Mango Lassi

1 cup plain yogurt

1 1/2 cup ice cold water
1 mango
3 T sugar

Combine all ingredients in a blender.
Blend about 15 seconds or until frothy.

Pour into glasses and serve immediately.


This is also quite lovely with rum.
But if you make grown-up lassi, add more sugar.

Mango Prawn Salad {with} Chicken

I found the inspiration for this recipe over at the good mood food blog.
I made a few changes, especially since I'd spent the day cutting up mango and just couldn't resist adding it to this already delectable looking ensemble ! Here's what I did ....

Serves 2 (whopping huge salads ... we had ONLY this for dinner !)

spring onions , chopped
1 garlic clove,peeled and crushed
1 tbsp soy sauce
Freshly ground black pepper
10 uncooked king prawns, my fish shop has ones marinated in garlic and parsley ... I used those.
1 chicken breast
fresh spinach leaves
fresh rocket
watercress (don't know that I'll worry about the watercress next time !)
1 ripe avocado
2 tomatoes, sliced
1 cup fresh mango, chopped into rather large pieces
Juice of 1 lemon
Handful of fresh basil, torn
olive oil

Heat the olive oil in a large frying pan over a medium heat. I used my big electric fry pan and was able to cook the chicken on one side and then the prawns on the other, only mixing them when they were cooked. Add the spring onions, crushed garlic, soy sauce, black pepper and chicken. Cook til chicken is just about done and then add the prawns. Cook til both chicken and prawns are cooked through. Arrange your salad ingredients on your plates ... I plated them onto two individual plates rather than doing in a big bowl. Top with chicken and prawns. Dress with lemon juice. Serve and enjoy !

Mango Madness

I adore mango. I haven't always. Well, I'm fairly certain that I'd never tried a mango until I went to India. The way they ate it there was to cut the top off and suck the flesh out. I found the skin to have a very unpleasant taste and came away thinking mango was a bit soapy. I didn't let that stop me from trying one when we got to Australia though ... and boy am I glad ! The mango here is insanely delicious ! So sweet. So juicy. It's a treat ! I loooove when mango season hits. This year was a particularly good season too ! Some of the mangos we ate were ENORMOUS ! So ... a month or so ago, not wanting to leave it too long and miss my chance (like I did last year) I bought a box of mango. This box cost me $20 ... which made them $2 each. That's a very reasonable price !

The way a fair dinkum Aussie eats a mango is to cut the two 'cheeks' off ...
as close to the seed as possible ... like you can see in the photo above.



Then you score it and push the flesh inside out and eat the luscious pieces just like that.
I, however, took it one step further ... I cut the pieces off and filled a ginormous bowl.



When I was done cutting it all up, I scooped one cup serves into snack size zip locks
and popped them into the freezer. Perfect for pulling out later to make mango ice cream !!!

And for dessert ...

... mango 'ice cream' !!

Super easy.

Use a small tupperware of frozen mango ...
the one that you conveniently froze the night before.
Remove the tupperware and put the mango into your blender.
Add one banana.
And a couple spoonfuls of greek yogurt.

Blend.

This was so thick and creamy.

And sweet.

Rory's comment was "I think this one may actually be better than store bought ice cream" !

Brekky

Years ago, my children started eating raw oats.
They just topped them with milk and ate them. They still do it.
I've decided to add to the oats ... and we all love it.

Here's what I do.
In a big plastic cereal container, I mix :

Rolled Oats.
Sunflower seeds.
Sesame seeds.
Flax seeds.
Slivered Almonds.
Pumpkin Seeds.

To eat we mix through some greek yogurt and top with some yummy fruit.
I keep frozen berries in the freezer. They are easy.
Fresh mango is yummy too ...

Lamb Skewers with Mango Chutney

--
Ok people, this is a recipe that you need to try right now !

I'm serious.

It is THAT good.

I found this recipe at the Steamy Kitchen blog. I made the whipped feta as well but we didn't like it. We also made naan instead of pita ... but next time I won't make bread. I'll just do the skewers with the chutney and rice.

For the mango chutney:
1 tablespoon olive oil
1/4 red onion, diced
1/2 jalapeno, seeds discarded and finely diced (note ... i did not add the jalapeno)
1 large mango, diced
1/4 cup sugar
4 tablespoons cider vinegar
1/2 teaspoon salt

Heat a small pot over medium-high heat. Add the olive oil and swirl to coat. Add the red onions and saute until softened, about 3 minutes. Add the remaining ingredients and simmer for 15 minutes.

For the lamb skewers

1 pound ground lamb
1/4 red onion, diced
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon paprika
1/2 teaspoon salt
Freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon minced fresh oregano ( I didn't have fresh as my herb garden died a sad and lonely death while we were in the States for six weeks ... dried oregano was fine )
1 tablespoon olive oil, plus extra for brushing on grill
24 bamboo skewers, soaked in water for 20 minutes (uh, didn't soak mine !)

Combine all ingredients in a bowl and mix well. Form long “patties” around doubled skewers. You can grill the kabobs on your outdoor grill or in your broiler, 3-4 minutes each side. (Rory did ours in the broiler ...)

And they made great leftovers to take to work the next day ....