Walking through a Fruit Stand...and WHAMMO!

Hey there, DDITK readers!!!

Today is Sunday - otherwise known as - Carm-tries-to-find-inspiration-for-dinner day.

I decided to head off to the Fruit Stand with the family because recently I've gone through a Sugar Snap Pea w/ Ranch kick and well...I thought it would be good to support my local fruit stand because I needed more. And there it was...sitting by the front door...(angels on high voices here) ICEBERG LETTUCE!

The last time I had iceberg lettuce, was at P.F. Changs. My husband and I took a much needed date day - now that our girls are old enough to stay home and not a.) catch the house on fire and b.) they won't kill eachother....hopefully. But back to the Iceberg Lettuce thing...on their menu is an appetizer called "P.F. Chang's Chicken Lettuce Wraps". Now, I'm sort of a picky eater. I'm branching out a bit more these days but there was a time where I would scrunch my nose at anything that wasn't french fries or mozzerella sticks. Yeah...that was me. BUT NOT ANYMORE!! No sirreebob!!

Here comes our waiter - a plate of lettuce leafs all stacked cute and a plate mounded with a stir fried concoction of what I assumed was the "chicken". It smelled IN. CREDIBLE! I raised an eyebrow and looked at another table that had ordered the same thing and watched them for clues on what to do with this stuff. Simply scoop the chicken into a lettuce leaf and VIOLA! Eat it sorta like a taco/burrito...a..."Tarrico" if you will...

So, I saw the lettuce at the fruit stand and grabbed my cell phone...no - I grabbed two heads of lettuce and THEN grabbed my cell phone. I searched the internet for "P.F. Changs Chicken Lettuce Wrap" and OMG, people...there it was. THE RECIPE!!!!!!!!!!! I feverishly read through the ingredients to see if we had them all...I thought I had everything but some chicken and rice wine vinegar so I decided to hit the grocery store after I dropped off the kids and the husband.



The entire recipe from start to finish takes about 25 minutes. This is going to be an AWESOME summertime dinner to make when you want something light and not really heavy when it's hot outside.

I really hope that some of you try this. I feel like it's a healthy, filling dish and that this particular recipe will make enough for 2 healthy appetites. You certainly won't feel that you need anything else with this dish. It was really easy and simple.

Here's the recipe from food.com:

Ingredients:
3 tbsp oil
2 boneless skinless chicken breasts
1 c. water chestnuts
3 tbsp. onions
1 tsp minced garlic
6-8 leaves iceberg lettuce


Special Sauce Ingredients:
1/4 c. Sugar
1/2 c. water
2 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp rice wine vinegar
2 tbsp ketchup
1 tbsp lemon juice
1/8 tsp sesame oil
1 tbsp hot mustard
1-2 tsp garlic and red chili paste

Stir Fry Sauce Ingredients:
2 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp brown sugar
1/2 tsp rice wine vinegar

Add soy sauce, rice wine vinegar, ketchup, lemon juice and sesame oil.

Mix well and refrigerate this sauce until you're ready to serve.

Combine the hot water with the hot mustard and set this aside as well.

Eventually add your desired measurement of mustard and garlic chili sauce to the special sauce mixture to   pour over the wraps.

Bring oil to high heat in a wok or large frying pan.

Saute chicken breasts for 4 to 5 minutes per side or done.

Remove chicken from the pan and cool.

Keep oil in the pan, keep hot.

As chicken cools mince water chestnuts and mushrooms to about the size of small peas.

Prepare the stir fry sauce by mixing the soy sauce, brown sugar, and rice vinegar together in a small bowl.

When chicken is cool, mince it as the mushrooms and water chestnuts are.

With the pan still on high heat, add another Tbsp of vegetable oil.

Add chicken, garlic, onions, water chestnuts and mushrooms to the pan.

Add the stir fry sauce to the pan and saute the mixture for a couple minutes then serve it in the lettuce"cups".

Top with"Special Sauce".

I can't wait to hear how much you love this!! You certainly will and if you don't? Um......you should see if you can sign up for the taste-bud organ donor program I've heard so much about. Okay - I'm not sure there is such a thing...but I'm an organ donor - so maybe someday someone will get my taste buds. Ew...nevermind...why would someone want me to live through them with my tastebuds? Oh crap...I'm being gross now, you probably don't even WANT to eat anything now. *sigh* HA!