Griddled Cajun Chicken – 3sp

On New Year’s Eve the OH and I headed up to Scotland with friends for a celebration. Heading out for lunch, we ended up in a lovely cosy little pub with a mouth-watering food menu. Keen to not over indulge before the excess of the evening ahead, I picked out what I thought was the healthiest thing on the menu and hoped for the best. I was thrilled when the dish arrived and had both an abundance of 0sp elements, but was also bursting with flavour.

I knew straight away I wanted to recreate something similar at home so tonight I set to it. The result was delicious. It’s such a straight forward and easy dish to make that I don’t think my OH was expecting much from it. We were both blown away with how filling, healthy and easy this one was. The pub served the dish with a slice of bacon on top of the chicken too but as I forgot to purchase any, I missed this out. Feel free to add this if you fancy but don’t forget to add the extra smart points.

I served this dish with butternut squash chips made in my new airfryer. This meant the total of the whole dish was just 3sp. You could easily serve this with rice or the carb of your choice but remember to add the points. Alternatively you could turn it into more of a salad and add more 0pp salad ingredients such as pepper, cucumber etc.

Griddled Cajun Chicken

Serves 2 = 3sp/341 calories per person (Flex)

For the chicken

2 x 165g chicken breasts, raw, flattened to around 1cm thick (I used a rolling pin)

2 tbsp Cajun spice

1 lime, quartered

1 slice of Mexicana cheese, halved (I got mine from Tesco, or 30g of cheese of your choice, sliced)

2 tbsp salsa

1 tbsp reduced fat sour cream

For the salad

Bag of mixed salad leaves

½ red onion, sliced

½ carrot, very finely sliced

Handful of tomatoes, quartered

6 jalapenos, finely chopped

Handful of coriander chopped

1 tbsp white wine vinegar

Accompaniments

1 Butternut, peeled, sliced and baked into chips (be sure to add the calories if you are counting. These are 0sp.

Method

If you are serving this dish with butternut squash chips, pop them on to cook first. Then, when your chips have around 25 minutes cooking time left, take your chicken and season with the Cajun spice and salt and pepper.

Take a griddle pan (or frying pan), spray with 1kal (or spray oil if you prefer but remember to add the points) and heat. Then add the chicken to the griddle pan and cook for 6-7 minutes on one side. Flip and cook on the other side for 6-7 minutes (or until cooked through). Flip again, squeeze the juice of ½ lime on each breast and then top with the cheese. Turn the heat down and let the cheese melt a little.

While the chicken is cooking, pop all the ingredients for the salad in a large bowl and toss together with the white wine vinegar. Then share equally between two pasta bowls or plates. Remove the chicken from the pan and pop on top of the salad. Top each chicken breast with a tbsp. of salsa and sour cream and a sprig of coriander.

Serve the dish with the butternut squash chips and another ½ of lime per person.

Enjoy!