Easy chicken tray bake

Recently I’ve been developing go-to recipes that I can throw together with things I’m guaranteed to have at home, that are quick and easy, with results that the kids are guaranteed to love.

To be honest, since I got married I’ve really struggled with the whole cooking dinner thing and keeping my pantry and fridge stocked with the right ingredients to throw a meal together.

I really think it is a skill that you need to be taught.

Or you just learn as you go, you learn what works for you and your family.

I’ll go into what I’ve learnt about keeping one’s pantry and fridge stocked another day. For now, here is my recipe for an easy chicken tray bake. And when I say easy, I mean literally chop it all up and throw it all together then shove it in the oven and forget about it, and I promise it will taste great.

So, here goes…

You will need:

Chicken thigh fillet, or chicken breast, or wings, or basically whatever chicken you have in your freezer. (In saying this, I will specify that I only buy organic chicken, not because I think I’m some posh hipster, but because eating organic matters.)

Potatoes

Pumpkin

Onions are optional based on how picky your kids are. Mine don’t like it so I don’t use it.

Lemon

Olive oil

Tomato paste

Turkish red pepper paste (you can find it an Coles in the ‘international foods’ aisle)

Chicken seasoning

How to cook it:

1. Peel and chop the veggies. With the lemon I only use a few finely sliced wedges.
2. Throw them in a casserole dish.
3. Chop chicken. Throw that in there as well.
4. Put chicken seasoning and olive oil over it. Be liberal with the seasoning, don’t be afraid to use a fair bit. If you don’t use enough, the flavour won’t come through.
5. Take a tablespoon of red pepper paste and tomato paste, put it in a medium sized mug with water and stir until both are diluted. Pour over the veggies and chicken mix.
6. Cover with foil (this is also optional).
7. Put it in the oven on 200degrees for around 30 minutes-40 minutes, depending on your oven etc.
8. Stir it every now and then (you don’t really have to) and adjust seasoning. Sometimes I add ground cumin and a bit of extra salt.
9. It’s done. You now have a meal that is healthy and nutritious and tastes great.

You can cook any sides you and your children like as an accompaniment to this meal. I usually cook rice, or if I really can’t be bothered I just serve it with bread. For extra veggies I’ll cook some corn or broccoli in boiling water. Also, a trick I use to get the kids to eat the pumpkin without them realising is to mash it into the rice. The pumpkin cooks beautifully in this meal and is so soft that you can just mix it into the rice. They never even realise that they are gobbling down pumpkin. #MumWin

That’s it.

Easy.