Healthy Soup - Week 4: Palak Chicken

Well, we made it through the first month of 2010.

I'm having a pretty amazing, lazy day - besides my hike this morning. Now, I'm filtering through pics from the week and realized I've been holding out on you by not posting more. I better start sharing!

Remember back during the first week of our weight challenge I promised to post a healthy soup each week? Well, I meant for this recipe to be my soup entry - and it is - but honestly it was more like a stew. A very delicious stew. You probably do not want to wait to cook this. It's that good. (Lyndie - I used less olive oil in the soup so I'm sure you and Terri will smile at memories of more!)

Palak Chicken
6 servings - 4 WW pts/serving + 4WW pts for 1 cup steamed rice
1 10-ounce package of frozen spinach
1 onion - diced
3 cloves of garlic - minced
32 ounces of chicken stock
2 chicken breasts
1 cup of unsweetened soy milk (or cream if you don't care about the calories)
1 tbsp garam masala
1 tbsp tumeric
1 tbsp paprika
1 tsp kosher salt
1/2 tsp crushed red peppers
1/2 tsp cayenne powder
1 tbsp + 1 tsp olive oil
1 tbsp soy sauce

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Marinate the chicken breasts in 1 tbsp olive oil and soy sauce for 30 minutes. Cook the chicken for 18 minutes turning halfway through the cooking. Set aside to cool.

In a heavy stock pan drizzle the 1 tsp of olive oil along with the garlic and crushed red. Toss in the onions and saute for about 5 minutes. Add in the remaining spices. Cook, stirring to incorporate the spices for about 2 minutes. Squeeze the water from the spinach. Chop the spinach to reduce the stringiness. Add in the chicken stock and soy milk. Bring back up to temperature. Cut the chicken breasts into cubes. Toss in the chicken. Simmer for about 10 minutes.

Enjoy with some flat bread wedges or rice.