Chicken Stir Fry with Broccoli, Green and Yellow Beans

More CSA-inspired goodness, this time with green and yellow beans as the centerpiece. I can't remember where I got this recipe, but modified it a bit from the original - didn't have any red pepper sauce. It was delicious and literally took me maybe 10-15 minutes to throw together. We marinated our chicken the night before when we cooked another chicken dish, and this made it even faster and easier. I also tossed on a bit of the thai peanut sauce noted in the previous recipe at the end, which gave some additional flavor.

* 6 ounces boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cubed
* 3 tablespoons soy sauce
* 3/4 teaspoon Asian spice blend
* 1/4 cup vegetable oil
* 1/2 pound green beans, stem ends trimmed, cut into 3-inch lengths (we used green and yellow)
* 1 tablespoon minced garlic
* 1/4 cup roughly chopped cashews
* 2 tablespoons hoisin sauce
* 1 teaspoon sesame oil
* 1 tablespoon lightly toasted white sesame seeds
* 1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
* Chopped green onions

Directions

In a bowl, combine the chicken, 4 1/2 teaspoons of the soy sauce, and Asian spice blend. Toss to coat and let sit for 10 minutes. (We just marinated our chicken in a thai peanut marinade from Whole Foods the night before and threw it in the pan.)

In a large wok, heat the oil over high heat and cook some of the green onions. Add the chicken and stirring constantly, cook until brown, 1 to 2 minutes. Add the beans and stir-fry until wrinkled, stirring, about 2 to 3 minutes; add the broccoli about a minute after the beans. Add the garlic and cook, stirring, for 10 seconds. Add the cashews, hoisin, remaining 3 teaspoons of soy sauce, sesame oil, sesame seeds, and red pepper flakes. Stir to coat, and cook for 1 minute. Remove from the heat and serve immediately over white rice. Garnish with green onions.

Napa Cabbage, Chicken and Thai Peanut Sauce Salad

We inherited our friends' CSA haul for two weeks while they're out of town, which has literally been a life changing experience. My mom jokes about her "balanced lifetime" philosophy towards vegetable eating, developed to avoid guilt over my picky eating in childhood; the idea was that over the course of a whole lifetime, I'd eat enough vegetables. Well, this week has certainly made up for those early years - I probably have had more servings of vegetables than I did for the first decade of my life.

Today I chose to use the giant, gorgeous Napa cabbage from Tantre farms and made this delicious, hearty, healthy protein-filled salad, with an absolutely delectable homemade peanut sauce I found on the internet from a great site called shesimmers.com. This is my new favorite thing, and the chef/blog author says it keeps for weeks in the fridge. I can imagine a lot of other uses besides salad dressing too, like stir frys (fries?) or satays.

For salad:
1 head Napa cabbage
1 chopped green onion, mostly white parts
Black sesame seeds
Toasted sesame seeds
Unsalted peanuts
2 boneless skinless chicken breasts, cubed

Cut up green leafy parts of Napa cabbage into bite size pieces and put in bowls. Garnish with unsalted peanuts, black and toasted sesame seeds, and chopped green onion. Meanwhile, cook the cubed chicken pieces in a nonstick skillet with some olive oil. Put chicken on top of prepared salads and top with Thai peanut sauce, add sea salt and pepper to taste.

For Thai peanut sauce dressing:
1 13.5 oz can of coconut milk
About 1/4 cup of Thai red curry sauce
3/4 cup peanut butter (I used chunky but the original recipe says creamy)
1/2 tablespoon salt
3/4 cup sugar (I used a little less)
2 tablespoons white vinegar (can use cider too, just not red)
1/2 cup water

Combine everything in a saucepan and bring to a low boil over medium heat, whisking constantly.
Let the mixture simmer for 3-5 minutes.
Serve over salad.

Salad adapted from shesimmers.com, peanut sauce recipe at http://www.shesimmers.com/2009/03/how-to-make-thai-peanut-sauce-my-moms.html