Chicken Fajitas

Yay, chicken fajitas! So easy to make, and so quick. A little bit of back story. The word “fajita” means “little belt” from “faja” for strip or belt, and the diminutive “ita”. It describes a skirt steak, and fajitas were traditionally made with grilled skirt steak, though now they can be made with chicken, shrimp, you name it.

The method is to quickly sear the meat on a griddle or grill, slice and serve with quickly seared peppers and onions and flour tortillas.

Now with a skirt steak it makes a lot of sense to quickly sear the meat and cut it against the grain to serve. You want the steak to be rare in the middle.

But with chicken? Not so much. Rare is not good for chicken. A way to get around this is to either cut the chicken in strips to begin with or to start with thinner pieces of chicken.

We prefer to start with a thinner piece of chicken, that way it’s less likely to dry out. Rather than thinning the meat with a meat pounder, we slice the chicken breasts horizontally.

The cutlets are then marinated (an hour or longer) in a spicy marinade with chili powder, cilantro, and jalapeño. To cook, you sear the cutlets on a hot cast iron pan (you could also easily use a hot grill), and after letting them rest a few minutes, slice them across the grain of the meat. Cook the peppers and onions in the same pan while the meat is resting.

Chicken Fajitas Recipe

Ingredients

• 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 pounds skinless, boneless chicken breasts
• Salt
• 2 Tbsp canola, safflower, peanut or grapeseed oil (a high smoke point oil)
• 1 large onion, sliced lengthwise (root to tip) into 1/4-inch strips
• 3 bell peppers of various colors, sliced into 1/4-inch strips

Marinade

• 2 Tbsp lime juice
• 3 Tbsp olive oil
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon chili powder
• 1/2 jalapeno, seeded and minced
• 1/4 cup chopped cilantro

Extras

• 8-12 flour tortillas
• Salsa
• Sliced avocado
• Sour cream
• Thinly sliced iceberg lettuce dressed lightly with salt and cider vinegar

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