I Can't Believe its healthy Tamarind Chicken

Looking at these succulent sticky pieces of chicken you would think that they are loaded with calories, right?! Wrong!! The marinade is actually cleverly low in fat and if you bake the chicken piece on a wire rack in the oven all the excess fat drips off. The marinade gives a wonderful South East Asian flavour to the chicken meat, even when ( or IF) you discard the skin, the flavours penetrate all the way through the  juicy meat. This is a super quick recipe to prepare, but obviously the longer you leave the chicken to marinate the better.

The trick to low fat recipes I find is using fresh herbs and spices to flavour the food. Asian cuisine is fantastic for this with the holy trinity of garlic, ginger and chilli. So no need to compromise too much on taste when cooking with South East Asian style and its calorie friendly also.

Ingredients

Marinade

• Tamarind sauce (I used the jar from Marks and Spencers)
• 1 red chilli, deseeded and diced finely
• 1 thumb size piece of peeled ginger, diced finely
• 2 cloves of garlic, minced.
• 1 stick of lemongrass, bruised and diced
• 1 lime, zested and juiced
• 2 tbsp of honey

• Chicken drumsticks or thighs, or even wings

Garnish

• Freshly chopped coriander
• lime wedges

(Note: I have been know to use shop bought chilli paste, garlic paste, lemongrass paste and ginger paste, in place of the fresh counterparts on occasion, making this a real store cupboard winner)

 

Method

1. Combine all the marinade ingredients together in a bowl and stir well to combine everything.
2. Place the chicken pieces in a shallow dish and cover with the marinade and allow to marinate for at least 1 hour but as long as you have really.
3. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees and line a baking tray with 2 layers of foil (to help with the washing up). Place a wire rack over the foil.
4. Place the chicken pieces on the rack and bake in the oven for 40 minutes.
5. Pour the remaining marinade from the shallow dish into a small saucepan and cook over a medium heat until reduced by half. Add another tsp of honey here if you like.
6. With a basting brush, brush the chicken pieces with the marinade every 5 minutes for 15 minutes.
7. When the chicken is cooked, brush the pieces with a final coating of the sauce before serving and scatter with lime wedges and coriander.