Caribbean Chicken with Sweet Potatoes and Onions

Caribbean Chicken
Serves 4
Ingredients

• 2 lbs of chicken breast, about 4 breasts
• 2 sweet potatoes
• 1 onion
• 1 garlic bulb, broken into whole cloves
• 3 tbsp of brown sugar
• 3 tbsp of lime juice
• 1 bottle of chili sauce
• 1/2 tsp of ground ginger*
• 1/8 - 1/4 tsp of red cayenne ground pepper*
• aluminium foil
• 1 cake pan, about 9" by 13"

*omit for a less spicy dish

1. Slice the sweet potatoes into thin slices and the onion into strips. Set aside with the garlic.
2. Combine the chili sauce, brown sugar, lime juice, ginger and red pepper together and set aside.
3. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
4. Line the pan with the foil - this is to collect the juices and prevent the pan from burning.
5. Spread the vegetables in the pan and cover with 2/3 of the sauce.
6. Cover the pan with more foil and cook in the oven for 20 minutes.
7. While the vegetables are cooking, cut the chicken into strips or chunks.
8. After 20 minutes, pull out the pan, add the chicken and the rest of the sauce to the vegetables and recover with the foil.
9. Cook for another 40 minutes and then serve.

I don't think there's anything inherently Caribbean about this dish but I've called it that for so many years that I can't call it anything else. I generally dislike spicy dishes but I make an exception for this one - the sauce is probably my favorite part.

Overall this takes about 2 hours to make. It's best done on the weekend and if I make a whole batch, with or without chicken, it's enough to feed me for a week.

Timing-wise, it's possible to add the chicken at the beginning, but I find the chicken can dry out too much in one hour and if the pan is in for only 40 minutes, the sweet potatoes tend to be hard.

Of course, I've also cooked this for an hour with no chicken at all and it was just as delicious. If I don't need to worry about the meat, the sweet potatoes and onions can be in the oven for as long as I want.

4 Chicken Breasts: $8.19 at Fred Meyer
2 Sweet Potatoes: $1.53 at Fred Meyer
1 Onion: $0.97 at Fred Meyer
1 Garlic Bulb: $0.33 at Fred Meyer
Lime Juice, 1/4 of a bottle at $0.99/bottle = $0.25 at Fred Meyer
Brown Sugar, 1/10 of a bag at $1.99/bag = $0.20 at Fred Meyer
Heinz Chili Sauce: $2.53 at Fred Meyer
Total Cost: $14 for 4 servings or $3.50 per serving