Week 41 - Lebanese

The Week 41 challenge, Lebanese, was one of my favorite challenges all year. (I thought it would be when I made it in October, but since it's taken me this long to finish this post, I can now say it with certainty in December.) It was so hard to choose a recipe since I love Lebanese food, but once I found a shish tawook recipe on Feel Good Foodie, I knew that I had to make that. We love getting shish tawook from restaurants, and this one looked delicious. Also, I had made some yogurt-marinated kebabs for our Afghanistan AtWCC and they hadn't turned out as well as I expected (which, of course, you wouldn't know since I still haven't finished that post), so this was a chance at redemption.

The ingredients we used were:

for the chicken and marinade (all spices eyeballed and estimated because I didn't use measuring spoons):

- about 1.5 lbs of boneless skinless chicken breasts ($7.23)

- 1/2 cup plain whole milk yogurt ($0.82)

- juice of 1 lemon (about 1/3-1/2 cup) ($0.39)

- 1/4 cup olive oil ($0.40)

- 1 large spoonful of minced garlic (with some of the garlic water) ($0.08)

- about 1 tsp paprika ($0.05)

- about 1 tsp cinnamon ($0.05)

- about 1 tsp garlic powder ($0.02)

- about 1/2 tsp oregano ($0.02)

- about 1/2 tsp ground ginger ($0.03)

- salt and freshly ground black pepper ($0.03)

for grilling the chicken skewers:

- grapeseed oil for the grill pan ($0.20)

- 1/2 red onion ($0.49)

for the salad we ate on the side:

- grape tomatoes ($2.79)

- Persian cucumbers ($1.99)

- 1/2 red onion ($0.50)

- a few scallions ($0.35)

- 1 can white beans ($0.79)

- 1 can chickpeas ($0.93)

- olive oil ($0.40)

- lemon juice ($0.20)

- sumac ($0.10)

- salt and pepper ($0.02)

also on the side:

- garlic spread ($2.99)

- whole wheat pita ($1.39)

Since we had a full salad alongside our skewers, it was, as expected, not an inexpensive meal. It ended up coming in around $22.26, more expensive than most of our challenge meals ($9.81 for the chicken skewers, $8.07 for the salad, and $4.38 for the accompaniments). We had some salad left over for lunch the next day, but that was it. A little bit more of a "splurge" cooking night, but worth it.

The steps for making the chicken were:

1. Mix yogurt, lemon juice, olive oil, minced garlic, paprika, cinnamon, garlic powder, oregano, ground ginger, salt, and black pepper in a large bowl.

2. Chop chicken into large chunks, and place into the bowl with the yogurt marinade, stirring to coat and making sure all the chicken is covered by the marinade. Cover with plastic wrap, and place in the fridge for at least 4 hours and up to 24 hours (I chilled ours for about 19 hours).

3. Thread the chicken on skewers with a chunk of onion on each end.

4. Add oil to grill pan, and then grill over medium high heat until cooked through and at least 165 degrees inside, about 5 minutes per side.

5. Remove finished skewers and place on plate to rest.

6. Serve skewers with sides (salad, garlic spread, and pita for us).

The salad on the side was just some prep and mixing, most of which I think I did prior to making the skewers. We got the garlic spread and pita from Trader Joe's since I knew I didn't have the capacity to make it all from scratch in one night.

This chicken was amazing. It was so tender, even the pieces from the skewers I left on the pan too long that got a bit browner than I had planned. I think what really helped these skewers come out better than the last yogurt-marinated kebabs I made was that I used plain yogurt instead of Greek yogurt thanks to the recipe notes/comments. I had no idea the water content of plain yogurt was so different (although I probably should have, given the different thicknesses of each yogurt type), so I'm thankful for the recipe note because it helped these turn out so much better than I expected. This was my first time skewering anything and using wooden skewers on our grill pan, and it was so much easier than I thought it would be. We loved our healthy Lebanese dinner, and we would absolutely do this again.