Chicken Breast Bicol Express

Bicol Express is one of my favorite Filipino dishes. From what I have learned it was first made popular by a lady named Cecilia Kalaw in Malate, Manila, in the 1960’s. She was a restaurant owner known as “Tita Cely”. In her childhood she spent a lot of time in the city of Bicol and thus called her recipe by that city’s name.

Now, the recipe is one of the favorite recipes that can be found anywhere in the Philippines as well as one of the feature recipes at Filipino restaurants in the United States.

The recipe is normally a combination of pork, usually pork belly, coconut milk, hot peppers, such as jalapeno or Thai peppers and the Filipino special ingredient of shrimp paste which gives the food its color and flavor.

To make the recipe a bit healthier I substituted the pork belly with boneless chicken breast making it both less fatty and higher in protein.

For those of you who are concerned about where to get shrimp paste, any Asian market should have some. I chose one that had a pink tint to it which makes the food colorful, but there are shrimp pastes that are brown in color if pink food puts you off.

It took me a few tries to get this recipe right. The first time I used too much coconut milk and it wasn’t spicy at all. The second try, I used not only too many jalapenos, but also some Thai peppers as well and it was so spicy that you couldn’t help but to break a sweat. You also had to have some milk close by to drink.

The third try seemed to be the charm. The taste was perfect. It was spicy, but not too spicy. Three jalapenos to one can of coconut milk was the right combination for a delicious meal.

This is something that may be a little bit different for you, but will definitely be worth it.

Ingredients

• 3 lbs boneless chicken breasts

• 1 13.5 ounce can coconut milk

• 2 raw onions

• 3 Jalapeno chili peppers

• 1 heaping tbsp Shrimp Paste

• 2 tbsp Garlic minced

• 1 tsp. minced ginger or a nickel size piece of ginger peeled and mashed

• 2 tablespoons olive oil

Instructions

1. Heat up a wok or deep pot.

2. Add the oil, garlic, onion, and ginger. Cook until ready for other ingredients

3. Chop up the boneless chicken into small pieces and add to the wok. Cook fully.

4. Add the shrimp paste and stir until for a few minutes until the paste is fully blended in the wok or pot.

5. Pour in the coconut milk and chopped Jalapenos. Bring to a boil. Turn temperature down to simmer for 30 minutes or more. One caution, do not boil too long or the milk may curdle.

6. Serve with rice. Enjoy!

Nutrition

Servings: 7

Calories: 384 calories per serving

Carbohydrates: 8.9g

Protein: 43.9g

Fat: 17.8

Saturated Fat: 9.4g

Cholesterol: 138mg

Sodium: 1094mg