Jamie Oliver - Eat your Heart Out

My dad gave me Jamie Oliver’s 15 Minute Meals this year. Like the Hairy Dieters (AKA the Hairy Bikers), Jamie believes anyone can cook and eat great, healthy food. However, Jamie claims you can do it in 15 minutes. Given that you’re not superhuman it may take you a little longer – it took me about half an hour. In Jamie’s defence, after cooking this meal a couple of times I think could get it down to 20 minutes. This is Jamie’s healthy Cajun chicken with sweet potato mash and salsa salad, apparently 651 calories per person, with some bits taken out/added by me.

Ingredients (serves 4) 1 bag of frozen sweet corn (corn on the cob is too much effort) 1 small bunch of fresh coriander 1 red chilli 4 spring onions 3 ripe tomatoes 2 limes Olive oil 800g sweet potatoes 2 tbsp sweet chilli sauce 4 x 120g skinless chicken breasts 1 tbsp Cajun seasoning Pinch of salt 4 tbsp natural yoghurt

Note that I omitted the 1tbsp of polenta, 20g feta cheese and 2 rashers of smoked streaky bacon that Jamie includes in his recipe. I couldn’t justify buying them when I was using such a small amount. I also didn’t use 175g okra, mainly because I didn’t know what it was (it basically looks like a cross between a courgette and a cucumber), but also because Sainsbury’s didn’t sell it. I added the yoghurt – trust me you’ll need it.

Preparation

Boil the kettle with lots of water. On a low heat, cook the bag of sweet corn on a frying pan with a splash of olive oil – Jamie, what kind of university student owns a griddle pan? Peel the sweet potatoes and roughly chop them into small cubes so they cook quickly. Put the sweet potatoes into a large pan on a medium heat. Add the water so that it just covers the potatoes.

On a large sheet of greaseproof paper toss the chicken in the Cajun seasoning with a pinch of salt. Fold over the paper than bash and flatten the chicken to 1.5cm thick with a rolling pin (or use the sweet chilli sauce bottle, if you don’t own one).

Add the chicken to a non-stick pan with 2 tbsp of olive oil, turning every 3 or 4 minutes, until golden and cooked through. Drain the sweet potatoes, return to the pan and mash with the sweet chilli. Put on a very low heat.

Put the sweet corn in a salad bowl. Finely chop the spring onion, coriander and chilli, roughly chop the tomatoes and add to the sweet corn. Add a pinch of salt, the juice of 2 limes and a splash of olive oil to the salsa.

Now serve the Cajun chicken on a bed of sweet potato mash with the salsa and yoghurt on the side. Trust me you’ll want the yoghurt. It’s a bit spicy.