Everyone has a favorite food, right? Mine happens to be a tried and true combination that every four year old in the world loves, chicken fingers and french fries. I would say I have a rather refined palette, but there is something about deep fried chicken parts with a side of potatoes that just does it for me. Though I've recently realized that my aging metabolism no longer wants to cooperate with my massive consumption of fried goodness so I have decided to make a change. I have started a quest to find healthy solutions to all my favorite unhealthy foods. This mission may seem impossible but I choose to accept the challenge.
Taking on a healthy cooking challenge is something that I know is going to be rather difficult for me. I am not a person who has an abundance of free time and I often work long hours and my commute, though completely reasonable, still gets me home after most people have already finished their dinner. So when I started scouring the Internet for recipes to accomplish my lofty goal of healthy junk food, one of my main qualifications for a good recipe is short preparation time. I have the attention span of a four year old and time-consuming recipes just aren't practical for me. The recipe that seemed easiest and healthiest was one I found at Eating Well's website. I wanted my chicken fingers to be as close to the real thing as possible without all of the guilt. After looking through about twenty recipes,Eating Well's Almond-Crusted Chicken Fingers seemed like the tastiest, easiest, and least time consuming recipe. So off I went to try it out.
I have complete faith in my cooking skills, but trying new recipes is always a little nerve racking. I went full speed ahead into this recipe and was pleasantly surprise with the results.
Almond-Crusted Chicken Fingers
Makes 4 servings
Active Time: 20 minutes
Total Time: 40 minutes
Ingredients
* Canola oil cooking spray
* 1/2 cup sliced almonds
* 1/4 cup whole-wheat flour
* 1 1/2 teaspoons paprika
* 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
* 1/2 teaspoon dry mustard
* 1/4 teaspoon salt
* 1/8 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
* 1 1/2 teaspoons extra-virgin olive oil
* 4 large egg whites
* 1 pound chicken tenders,(I used chopped up chicken breast)
Preparation
1. Preheat oven to 475°F. Line a baking sheet with foil. Set a wire rack on the baking sheet and coat it with cooking spray.
2. Place almonds, flour, paprika, garlic powder, dry mustard, salt and pepper in a food processor; process until the almonds are finely chopped and the paprika is mixed throughout, about 1 minute. With the motor running, drizzle in oil; process until combined. Transfer the mixture to a shallow dish.
3. Whisk egg whites in a second shallow dish. Add chicken tenders and turn to coat. Transfer each tender to the almond mixture; turn to coat evenly. (Discard any remaining egg white and almond mixture.) Place the tenders on the prepared rack and coat with cooking spray; turn and spray the other side.
4. Bake the chicken fingers until golden brown; crispy and no longer pink in the center, 20 to 25 minutes.
You can't have chicken fingers with out french fries, so I asked myself what is a healthy alternative to good old-fashioned yukon gold potatoes? Sweet potatoes of course! Now, let me say sweet potatoes and I have always had a tense relationship. It started in childhood where I used to refer to them as "nuclear potatoes" and has followed me into adulthood. Even the name always turned me off. Why in the heck would I want to eat a potato that was sweet, yuck! I decided that for the sake of a healthy meal I would prepare sweet potato fries. Sweet potatoes fries seem to be all the rage in restaurants, but until today I was not hopping on that orange bandwagon. Again, I looked for an easy and timely recipe. The easiest that I found was as follows.
Sweet Potato French Fries:
Cut 2 large peeled potatoes into ¼-inch strips and spread them in a single layer on a baking sheet coated with oil spray. Season fries with salt, black pepper, or any other seasonings (ground cinnamon, curry powder, and chili powder are all nifty options). Bake in a 400 degree oven for 20 minutes, flipping the fries halfway through. You can finish your fries under the broiler for 5 minutes to get them extra crispy!
After all was said and done I had prepared my healthy chicken fingers and french fries, it now was time for me to try them out. Healthy isn't always tasty, but I had hope for this experiment. After looking at what I had prepared skeptically, I took my first bite. Yum! Success! Now, let me say nothing quite beats deep friend chicken parts and crispy shoestring potatoes, but this comes in a close second! Enjoy and if you try it let me know how it turns out.
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