Pinned and Tried: Cilantro Chicken and Spicy Thai Noodles

You all know by now that I love Pinterest.  Well, I'm a big believer that if you are pinnin' you better be doin'.  That is the only way to justify any time spent there (in my opinion, anyway).  Don't get me wrong.  I love to end my evenings sometimes just browsing through the pages and pin away, but I also know that if I pin it, I should make an effort to try it!  My daughters and I plan to do a lot of  trying and testing of the things we pin this summer and that's got me really excited!

Well, not too long ago, my friend made this meal for us and I asked her where she found it.  So she told me it was on foodnetwork.com and told me the name.   Later that evening, I made sure to look up the recipe and I pinned it.  I finally had a chance to try it out for myself.  I did not create this recipe.  Like I said, I got it from the food network and the exact recipe can be found here.  However, I did change up a few things to suit my tastes and what I had to work with... which is what you've got to do sometimes.  I also "eyeballed" a lot of the amounts of ingredients, but I tried to stay true to what was listed.  So... here it is.  We LOVED it.

Ingredients

Cilantro Chicken:

• 4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts cut into 1 in. cubes (about 1 (+) pound)
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 2 tablespoons minced garlic
• 1/4 cup cilantro leaves
• 2 limes, 1 zested and 2 juiced
• 2 tablespoons seasoned rice vinegar

Thai Noodles:

• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 lime, zested and juiced
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
• 1 1/2  cups chicken stock
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 2 tablespoons Thai green curry paste
• 1 tablespoon seasoned rice vinegar
• 3 green onions, white and green parts, chopped, (save a bit for garnish)
• 1 pound spaghetti, cooked al dente (I love Barilla pasta. Al dente every time)
• 1/4 cup crushed roasted peanuts

Directions

For the chicken, combine all ingredients in a bowl and let it marinade for about 30 minutes.

Cook on medium high heat in a pan until chicken is opaque and done, but not over-cooked.

For noodles, I had them boiling while I prepared the chicken.  I drained the noodles and let them sit for a minute while I took the same pot that I boiled the noodles in and added the olive oil, lime juice and zest, chicken stock, garlic and pepper flakes.  I gave those a good stir and seasoned with salt and fresh pepper.  Then I added curry paste, green onions and the rice vinegar and made sure it was all combined and let it simmer for a about a minute or two.  I then added a little bit of the chicken to the pot, then some of the noodles and kept tossing, then some more chicken and more noodles, toss... until it was all in one pot.  I added the crushed roasted peanuts and then gave it a final toss.

I wanted to make sure that everything was thoroughly coated with the delicious sauce.

I served the dish on my beautiful, red Princess House dish and then garnished it with LOTS of chopped cilantro and chopped green onion.

Everybody loved it.  My husband and 4 children (ages range from 4 - 16) kept saying how great it was.  There is a definite lime/cilantro taste, and  the curry paste and pepper flakes gave it a spicy kick that you could taste, but it wasn't so spicy that the little ones couldn't eat it.  Because of the lime and cilantro, it also tasted light, fresh and very summery.

The original recipe calls for ginger and carrots.  Well, I forgot to add the carrots and I didn't buy any ginger.  You can check his recipe on the link to see how much you'll need to add.

This dish was great and a definite keeper.  I LOVE finding great dishes on Pinterest.  

Do you have any good recipes or links to share? =)