Receta Chicken with Chickpeas and Preserved Lemon; French Health Care
The weather has finally cleared, the sun has come back to us and the garden is growing.
Just to clean out my files, here is the last of our cold, wet spring dinners….
I hope.
I still have half of a container of preserved lemons in the fridge…. I’m thinking they’ll be good in salads.
Chicken with Chickpeas and Preserved Lemon
Total time: 30 minutes
Ingredients:
- 2 chicken breasts, cut into bite-size pieces
- 1 onion, quartered and sliced
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 2 medium carrots, cut into matchsticks
- 14oz (400gr) chickpeas, rinsed and drained
- 1/4 cup Greek olives (about 12), chopped
- 3oz (90gr) feta, crumbled
- 1/2 preserved lemons, pulp removed, sliced
- 2 tsp olive oil
- 1/2 cup chicken stock
- 1/4 cup dry sherry
- 2 tsp cornstarch (Maizena) dissolved in 1 tbs water
- 1/2 cup orzo
- 1 cup chicken stock
- 1 cup water
Instructions:
Cook orzo in 1 cup stock and 1 cup water, boiling, until done, 10 – 12 minutes. Drain.
Heat olive oil in large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add onion, carrots to skillet and stir-fry for 4 minutes.
Add garlic,chicken and stir-fry until chicken is cooked through.
Add chickpeas, chicken stock, sherry, and bring to a boil.
Cover, reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes.
Dissolve cornstarch in water. Add to skillet and stir until thickened.
Add olives, feta and lemon. Stir, just until the feta starts to melt.
Remove from heat and serve over orzo
I got a notice from the French health care system today. I’m due for my mammogram. It’s done every two years in France.
It’s one of those things about living here that I’m not quite sure how I feel about.
Not the mammogram, the notice from the System.
My doctor doesn’t schedule it or tell me to schedule it. I get the notice in the mail and am expected to get it done. I’m given the films and am expected to take them to my doctor at my next appointment for her to revue
And if I don’t, they nag.
It’s kind of like Big Brother, but in a good way.
I think…..
It’s not just the mammogram the System nags about. Three years ago we were told it was time for a complete physical – which seemed like a good idea, so we both immediately scheduled it.
Still, it was their idea…. and we were told where to go and what time to be there.
Then, of course, is my favorite: the hemoccult test kit.
The first time that came in the post I promptly ignored it.
A month later I got another one, with a chastisement that I had not submitted the first one they sent and to please take care of it NOW.
In fear of having someone show up at my door to, ahem, assist me, I did as I was told.
As I dropped it in the post box I had visions of all these completed hemoccult test kits floating / flowing through the French postal system.
Gives one pause, doesn’t it?
Just so you know…. We had an entire day of sunshine.
Last Updated on June 3, 2013