Confession: I ate more food over the holidays than I think I’ve ever eaten in my life. And by holidays I mean Halloween through the New Year… plus a few days. I know I should say “everything in moderation blah blah blah.” But sometimes binge eating is good for the soul. And I do not regret it one bit!
But now that it’s the New Year, I should probably start to control my eating. So I’ve been trying out some new healthy recipes.
Personally, I think two of the most important things to strive for when trying to eat healthy are convenience and “knockout” taste (I couldn’t think of a better word than “knockout” and I went kickboxing this morning so that’s where that came from). This is what I mean by that – no one will want to continue to cook healthy meals if they’re difficult or if they’re bland.
Keeping that in mind, I decided to make slow cooker Asian chicken lettuce wraps!
I’m a big fan of P.F. Chang’s lettuce wraps and I knew I could make a slow cooker version, so that’s what I set out to do. P.F. Chang’s uses ground chicken in their lettuce wraps, but I prefer the way chicken breasts cooks In the slow cooker, so that’s what I used. The chicken breast shreds easily after cooking in the slow cooker and it combines well with the sauce.
Another thing to note is that the chicken gets it’s “knockout” taste from the Sriracha and the freshly grated ginger.
Can you omit these ingredients? Yes, but I can’t promise you’ll have the same “knockout” taste.
Can you substitute regular hot sauce for Sriracha? Yes, but the taste will be slightly different. Sriracha is a bit sweeter and more garlicky (garlickier?) than hot sauce or Tabasco sauce.
Also, if you don’t like lettuce, you can serve this chicken over brown rice instead, and it will be equally tasty.
Slow Cooker P.F. Chang’s Chicken Lettuce Wraps
Servings: Enough for about 12 lettuce wraps
Ingredients
- 2 pounds chicken
breast - 1 red bell
pepper, finely chopped - 1/2 cup yellow
onion, finely chopped - 1/2 cup hoisin
sauce - 3 cloves
garlic, minced - 2 Tablespoons
soy sauce - 2 Tablespoons
Sriracha - 1 Tablespoon
freshly gated ginger (or 1 teaspoon ground ginger) - 1 head big leaf lettuce (you can either use bibb lettuce,
Boston lettuce, or butter lettuce)
Optional toppings:
- Chopped green
onion - Shredded
carrots - Roughly chopped
peanuts - Toasted sesame
seeds - Pineapple
- White or brown
rice
Directions
- Place chicken breast, red bell pepper, yellow onion, hoisin
sauce, garlic, soy sauce, Sriracha, and ginger in a slow cooker. Cover and cook
on low heat for 3 to 4 hours until chicken is tender and fully cooked. - Shred the chicken and combine with the sauce left in the
slow cooker. - Separate leaves from head of lettuce.
- To serve, place 1/4 cup chicken filling on top of lettuce.
Add optional toppings like green onion, shredded carrots, peanuts, sesame
seeds, pineapple, and brown rice.
NOTES
You can make this with ground turkey, ground chicken, or ground beef instead.
Recipe adapted from Cooking Classy.
