Lemon Thai Chicken

April 9, 2011 • Light and Tight Series, Recipes

If I may be so bold, allow me to introduce to you a woman in Los Angeles, California yes I said it, the fitness capital of the world who is downing a pizza the size of small car tire. And a New York father dipping his already drenched cheese and chili french fries in ranch dressing. Then there are the folks in Florida noshing on deep fried chicken wings slathered in a one of a kind bleu cheese dressing that hey, I agree you gotta have it sometimes. What do these adoring parents of small children all have in common? They have muttered the words I keep hearing over and over, “I can’t control what my child eats!” Oh, and I purposely left out the well publicized appalachian “Mountain Dew” rumor of babies being fed the yellow jacked up drink in their bottles for the simple fact that I doubt it’s representative of everyone in this area and I may or may not like the stuff myself. Moving on, hearing those words as I set aside my own convictions and biases, I am left to use my experiences with good old fashioned logic which causes me to raise a few eyebrows well actually only two eyebrows since that’s all I came equipped with at birth. Don’t we all control, not only what we eat but what we feed our children especially if they’re small? I heard this old Catholic “proverb” for lack of a better word, that I’m not sure if they whole heartedly believe but I definitely discovered some credibility and personal truth. “Give me a child to until the age of seven and I’ll have them for the rest of their lives.” Of course, this statement relates to their doctrine, meaning if they exposed the little one to their statements of faith and teachings regularly until the age of seven they would have their mind for the rest of their lives. For better and in some cases worse my children’s eating habits mirror this statement. I didn’t forbid sugar and pizza made a once a week welcomed appearance in our home. The other days of the week served as my unpainted canvas allowing me to debut vegetable laden healthy cuisine. The truth is I did control their diets and so do you. I am not ignorant of my own devices. I’m pretty sure the fact that my children like soda pop is because I owned stock in the company. Not really. Though they enjoy the drink, they also indulge in healthy eating habits including vegetables like broccoli. However, I did have to get creative with broccoli because slathering it in cheese or ranch dressing is counter productive and not what I consider a healthy choice of food. The fact that both of my children like peas let’s me know that I did not discriminate based on my dislikes because really, a pea pod is as close as I’ll get to those green balls of mush.

Introduce your child to a steady diet of healthy balanced meals and they will be inclined to those habits for the rest of their lives. I have long since quit being shocked at the amount of adults who claim they do not like something because either they have never tried it or they did once as a child and never again revisited. This next statement is pure logic. If you prepare healthy nutritionally sound food continually throughout the year, your children and you will eat it if there is nothing else available.

In my home, heat in the form of chili peppers (capsaicin) has been a common staple. I light up everything with it. My youngest child, Christian enters pepper eating contests regularly and I’m convinced it’s because I made his baby food and always added chili peppers. I grew them and canned them. They’re full of vitamin C and other nutrients. It’s totally a myth that they hurt your stomach. Like anything else your body becomes accustomed. Lemon thai chicken with asparagus is very spicy but healthy and a delicious introduction to eating right. You can exclude the pasta and make this meal low carb or add your favorite vegetable in place of the asparagus. It’s your creation–make it your own.