A Cool Salad of Herbs and Yogurt with Honey Sriracha Tempeh

I love, love, LOVE it when leftovers from dinner provide the perfect next-day lunch. Last night, we chowed down on Bon Appetit's Yogurt Marinated Chicken and Cucumber-Mint Raita from Epicurious. Both were amazing, and highly recommended. I set aside one of the two chicken breasts that I'd grilled last night for today's lunch.

Originally intending to make a sandwich with the chicken and raita, I found myself wilting in the heat and instead cravings something fresher. So, a salad it was!

I marinated a package of tempeh in sriracha, lime, honey and shallot to play off the balance of cool herbs in the raita. Grilled and served opposite the cold chicken, the salad totally hit the spot.

Hello summer! Aren't you looking colourful? Heirloom Ontario tomatoes, carrots, snow peas, lettuce, cucumber, romaine and butter lettuce, plus fresh mint to garnish. Man, oh man, was this some seriously tasty stuff. I'm planning on making a massive batch of raita up to dip veggies in this week.

Honey Sriracha Tempeh

Ingredients

1 block tempeh, cut into 16 slices
2 tbsp honey
2 tbsp sriracha
2 tbsp lime juice
1 shallot, minced
¼ tsp kosher salt


Directions

1. Whisk together honey, sriracha, lime juice and shallot. Place in a ziploc bag with tempeh. Marinate in fridge for at least 1 hour, preferably overnight.

2. Remove tempeh from marinade. Sprinkle with salt and grill over medium heat for 2 minutes on each side, just until grill marks form. Cut into chunks and sprinkle over salad.

Is there anything more beautiful than summer's produce? I think not.

Chicken Wings with Soy-Brown Sugar-Sriracha Sauce

One of my goals this year is to purchase my food with a conscious effort to know exactly where it comes from. I believe I mentioned Rowe Farms before in my the post about the best roast chicken ever, but they're definitely worth mentioning again.

Their meat is locally raised (Guelph), hormone-free, antibiotic-free, hormone-free, nitrate-free... I could go on and on, but you might as well just read it for yourselves.

Anyway, they just opened a retail shop on Bloor, just a few blocks from our apartment.

Image from: West Annex News

And that makes me a very happy shopper. We don't buy tons of meat, but when we do, I like knowing it's from them.

This recipe was originally intended to be done in a crock pot and finished in the oven, but as I don't own a slow cooker I had to improvise. I slow cooked the wings for 3 hours in my Le Crueset enamelled cast iron dutch oven at 180º to mimic the conditions of a slow cooker.


Superbowl Chicken Wings
 
(adapted from Cooks Country)

Ingredients

1 lb chicken wings, tips removed

Rub

1" piece ginger, grated
1 clove garlic
1 tbsp packed brown sugar
1 tsp soy sauce
½ - 1 tsp sriracha

Sauce

1 tbsp water
1 tbsp tomato paste
2 tbsp brown sugar
1 tbsp soy sauce
½  tsp - 1 tbsp sriracha (if you like it spicy add the tbsp)

Directions

1. MAKE RUB Pulse together all rub ingredients in a food processor or mini chopper. 

 Add mixture to dutch oven. Add chicken and toss until combined. 

2. COOK AND COOL Cover and cook on low until fat renders and chicken is tender, 3 to 4 hours.

Using slotted spoon, remove wings and transfer to clean plate. Let wings cool 20 minutes (or cool briefly and refrigerate up to 24 hours).

3. SAUCE AND BROIL Adjust oven rack to lower-middle position and heat broiler. Set wire rack inside rimmed baking sheet and spray rack with baking spray. Whisk water, tomato paste, remaining sugar, remaining soy sauce, and remaining cayenne in bowl. Add half of sauce to bowl with cooled wings and toss gently to coat.

Arrange wings, skin side up, on prepared rack. Broil until wings are lightly charred and crisp around edges, 10 to 15 minutes.

Flip wings, brush with remaining sauce, and continue to broil until well caramelized, about 3 minutes. Serve.

And I promise you it'll look like this at the end...

Urp. Nom, nom, nom!