Free Inquiry #3: Debbie’s Lettuce Wraps

This third recipe was inspired by my mother Debbie. Debbie loves to eat healthy and live healthy. She loves to play pickleball with my father, bike everywhere, and walk the dogs. This is a recipe we have made before and definitely checks a lot of “health boxes”. We don’t make these lettuce wraps too often but whenever we do there’s rarely any leftovers. They have a nice balance of sweet, spicy, crunchy, and freshness. This is the first recipe where there are less possible adaptations but I will still do my best to provide examples of where I think you can make any changes to the recipe. I love this recipe because it’s delicious, extremely colorful and has such amazing flavors. If you have ever eaten out and gotten lettuce wraps I hope this gives you some inspiration to make them at home.

Ingredients

• Iceberg lettuce
• Cabbage (red or white)
• Carrots
• Green onion
• ~400g Ground chicken
• Cilantro
• Peanuts – crushed
• Garlic – diced
• Ginger – diced
• Sesame oil
• Sugar
• Rice vinegar
• Lemon juice
• Sriracha
• Oyster sauce (optional)
• Chili paste (Sambal)
• Corn starch
• Sweet Chili sauce
• Soy sauce (low sodium)
• Plain yoghurt

Servings

This recipe is roughly for 4 people having 4-5 lettuce wraps each. Feel free to adjust the recipe accordingly.

Instructions – Lettuce Wrap Sauce

1. We will be making three sauces for the lettuce wraps: A sweet and salty sauce for the chicken and vegetables, a yoghurt sauce and a spicy vinegar sauce.
2. For the sweet and salty sauce combine 1/2 cup low sodium soy sauce, 1/4 cup sweet chili sauce, 1 tbs sesame oil, 1 tbs rice vinegar, 1 tbs oyster sauce, and 1 tbs sambal. Mix well and adjust seasoning if necessary.
3. For the yoghurt sauce combine 1/2 cup plain yoghurt with 1 tbs lemon juice, 2 tbs soy sauce, 1 tbs sweet chili sauce, 2 tsp sugar and 1 tsp rice vinegar If the sauce is too thin you can add a bit more yoghurt. Mix well to combine, taste, and adjust seasoning as needed.
4. For the spicy vinegar sauce combine 4 parts rice vinegar to 1 part sriracha. Mix well.
5. Refrigerate both until you are ready to serve.

Instructions – Lettuce Wrap Filling

1. Dice 3 cloves garlic and 2 tbs ginger (for this recipe I used fresh ginger in a jar).
2. Crush/dice your peanuts.
3. Grate one and a half cups of carrots and thinly slice about half of a medium sized cabbage.
4. In a large pan over medium heat, add 2 tbs sesame oil, and toast the peanuts. Make sure to stir regularly as nuts can burn fast.
5. Add the diced garlic and ginger and cook with the peanuts until fragrant (30s).
6. Add the ground chicken and mix well.
7. Add about half of the sauce to the chicken and peanut mixture as it cooks.
8. When the chicken is about 1/2 – 2/3 the way cooked, add in your carrots/cabbage. Mix well to combine.
9. Add the rest of the sauce and let the carrots and cabbage cook down.
10. To thicken the sauce, mix 1 tbs corn starch with 1 tbs water and add this slurry to the bottom of the pan. Mix well to incorporate everything. The sauce should thicken up.
11. Garnish the cooked chicken and cabbage with cilantro and green onion.

Instructions – Lettuce Wrap Formation

1. To make the lettuce wraps, peel the outer layer of the iceberg lettuce and then cut the entire head in half.
2. Peel a layer off each shell of the head to generate individual lettuce wraps.
3. Add however much filling you would like and top with whatever sauces you prefer. I like adding a bit of both.
4. ENJOY! Note: This is a messy dish. Make sure to have napkins ready.

Adaptations

Unlike my previous recipes, there is less play room here with how you make these but I will give a few examples of my favourite variations.

• If you are vegetarian you can substitute the ground chicken for tofu. I often add tofu even with the ground chicken because it adds more volume and nice flavors.
• Substitute ground chicken for your protein of choice. There are a lot of options here.
• If you want to get a little crunch you can try fried chicken. I use chicken breast here and cut it into small bite-sized cubes. Coat with corn starch and fry in oil until golden and crispy. Season with the sweet and salty sauce and thicken with the corn starch slurry. This is a more time consuming method.
• Top with crushed instant ramen noodles for an extra crunch and texture.

Pictures

Reflections

I have started to realize most of my cooking is very “off script” which means not following a recipe. I think it’s extremely important that inspiring cooks should follow recipes but also be able to adapt. A cook should constantly be tasting everything they are making and adjusting it in real time. No recipe is perfect and everyone tastes differently. Make sure that you are constantly tasting your dishes and adjusting the seasoning as needed. Learning how to balance flavors is something that I continually practice. The downside of this, is I have to pay close attention when I am cooking if I want to replicate something I make, or post on this blog so that others are able to closely replicate these dishes. On another note, this is a beautifully colored dish, it tastes amazing and is relatively healthy. I hope you all make this one and let me know what you think. Thanks to my wonderful mother for the inspiration on this one, enjoy!