Recipe: Mexican Chicken and Quinoa

Happy Hump Day people!  I wanted to share a recipe with you that we tried for dinner last night that was an absolute hit -- Mexican Chicken and Quinoa.  It is adapted from a recipe I found on Pinterest called One Pan Mexican Quinoa by damndelicious.net.  This meal is packed with protein, and best of all, it is all cooked in one pan, so there's very little clean up!

The original recipe calls for black beans, but I substituted chicken instead (we are not a fan of beans).  I also was limited to what we had in the pantry, so I will show you where you can make this meal even healthier than I made it. Instead of canned corn, frozen would cut down on the sodium.  For the tomatoes, choose either reduced sodium canned, or dice fresh tomatoes.  Rotel is kind of high in sodium, but has great flavor, if you use Rotel, like I did, I've included a trick in the directions that uses a celery stock to remove some of the excess salt from the dish.

Mexican Chicken and Quinoa

Ingredients
- coconut oil spray
- 2 cloves of garlic, minced
- 1 jalapeno, diced
- 2-3 chicken breasts cut into thirds
- can of corn (or 1 cup frozen corn)
- can of fire-roasted diced tomatoes, drained (or can of Rotel)
- 1 cup of quinoa
- 1 cup of reduced sodium chicken broth
- 1/2 tsp of cumin 
- 1 tsp mexican chili powder

Directions
(1) Spray a large, deep skillet with coconut oil to coat the pan.

(2) Add garlic and jalapeno, saute about a minute or until fragrant (garlic will start to show color).
(3) Add in chicken breast and brown on both sides. Season with cumin and chili power to taste on each side.
(4)Once chicken has been seared off, add corn, tomatoes, quinoa, chicken stock, cumin, and chili power. Bring to a boil, cover, and reduce to a simmer. Allow to cook, covered for 20 minutes.  **To reduce salt content, throw in a stick of celery cut in half, remove before serving**

(5) Uncover, remove chicken and shred it, put back into pan
(6) If liquid remains, cook uncovered for an additional 5-10 minutes until liquid has reduced.
(7) Serve and enjoy!