Monday 31st January - smoothie, maple citrus chicken

Yah - all three girls were back at school today. dd3 loved her first day at preschool so here's hoping that continues. I loved having some time by myself - and doing the shopping without a little one in tow was so much quicker and easier!

Breakfast - smoothie.

Dinner - Maple Glazed Chicken.

This is from the IntelliSteam website and I converted it to Thermomix.

Ingredients:

2 skinless, boneless chicken breasts - sliced

Finely grated zest and juice of 1 small orange

2 tbsp maple syrup

¼ tsp dried chilli flakes

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Rice and vegetables.

Method:

1. Place orange juice and zest, maple syrup, chilli flakes and salt and pepper in tmx bowl and mix for 5 secs on speed 4.

2. Place chicken in a bowl and pour the marinade over and place in fridge for at least 30 mins. Don't clean the bowl out.

3. Place rice in basket, 800ml water in bowl and chicken in foil boats with the marinade poured over in the Varoma.

4. Cook for 20 mins on Varoma temp speed 4.

5. With 5-10 mins left add vegetables on top varoma tray (depending on veg used, time needed to cook and personal preference).

The original recipe was for 4 chicken breasts but that's far more than we eat. If you were doing that amount I imagine you may need to cook longer as they would be layered a lot.

I also poured the juices into the bowl, added cornflour and cooked for 3 mins to make a sauce, but found it didn't have much flavour. If wanting to make a sauce I'd add the juice from 1/2 an orange as well.

This was a really nice chicken dish, it had a lovely citrusy taste and all the kids gave it a thumbs up.