If you are looking to gain muscle, lose weight, cut body fat, or trying to get healthy, chicken is a beautiful thing. Any poultry is a beautiful thing! It has a macro-nutrients aligned with most weight-lifting diets: Almost no fat and no carbohydrates, leaving you with almost pure protein. Slap that beauty on your plat with veggies galore and you are well on your way to weight loss and/or building up your muscle! Skinless chicken, of course.
The easiest way to prepare chicken is to marinade it and bake it in the oven while making enough to last you for a few lunches throughout your week. Sometimes, you just want something more, though.
Chicken With Fresh Salsa
Ingredients used: chicken breasts, salt & pepper, oregano, rosemary, thyme, garlic, basil, olive oil, tomatoes, onions, jalapeno (optional) or cilantro (optional).
Easy instructions: Start off by dicing your onions, mince your garlic, and dice your tomatoes. If you are using fresh Thyme, Rosemary, Basil, and Oregano, go head and chop those up now as well.
Add olive oil, salt and pepper, thyme, rosemary, oregano, and garlic to a bag or a bowl. Mix them up well, then add the chicken breasts to the mixture, stir (or shake) to coat the chicken breast and allow to sit while you prepare the salsa.
In a new bowl, combine tomatoes, onions, jalapeno or cilantro (or neither), garlic and oregano. Stir gently, then add salt and pepper to taste. Finish by drizzling olive oil over the salsa.
Take your chicken (hopefully you have managed to waste 30 minutes by this point, if not… Go clean up your prep dishes! Clean as you go!) Cook the chicken stove-top on a pan: You likely won’t need any olive oil or butter in your pan as the chicken has been marinating in olive oil from your marinade. Cook the chicken until all you can see is white on the outside, then pour any remaining marinade over the chicken into the pan, turn heat to low and allow to simmer for 5 or so minutes, until the chicken is no longer pink in the middle.
Slap those babies on your serving plate/bowl/table top (I won’t judge), and spoon on some delicious fresh salsa directly onto the chicken breasts.
Serve alone for a snack or lunch, or serve with a quinoa salad side, rice, salad… It’s chicken. Chicken goes with everything.