Green Chile Grilled Chicken

I’m just gonna leave this here: lime and garlic marinated grilled chicken smothered in fire roasted green chiles, sharp cheddar, and fresh sliced jalapeño.

Joe and I grill quite a bit.  We live in Montana, where winter is about nine months out of the year, so we are thrilled to have just moved into a place with a covered porch where we can keep the grill out year-round.  Will I be out there grilling in the freezing weather? Most certainly not.  But Mr. Husband will.  We have found that with low sodium cooking, some of our favorite meals are centered around a piece of meat thrown on the grill, served with veggies and a starchy side (rice, noodles, or potatoes).  I get really bored really quickly though, especially when it comes to food.  So when my sister told me about this amazing sandwich she’d had at a restaurant, I knew immediately that I wanted to recreate it with less sodium.   With robust flavors from green chiles and jalapeños, and a hint of lime and garlic, how could I go wrong?

You’ll notice, of course, that this version is not a sandwich.  Why not?  Well, because I was too lazy to make homemade rolls for this and can’t find great low sodium bread in my local stores.  If you have a great low sodium bread option (or are feeling more ambitious than me), try it as a sandwich – I am sure it would be great.  Otherwise, do what I do and serve it with a side of rice and a salad.

This recipe uses fire roasted green chiles. You can buy these in a can, but they are loaded with sodium. To get around this, I roast my own.  If you don’t know how to roast your own green chiles, go check out this post.  I typically roast 6-8 peppers at a time and freeze them in small containers (two chopped, roasted green chiles per container).  For this recipe you can either roast the chiles while the chicken is marinating or use some that you have on hand.

This chicken starts in a simple marinade of garlic, lime, olive oil, and black pepper and is finished with cheddar cheese and roasted green chiles.

You’ll notice that I butterflied the chicken and pounded it to an even thickness (somewhere between a quarter and a half-inch thick) before I put it in the marinade.

Just throw the chicken on the grill, but keep an eye on it so that it cooks evenly and stays juicy.  My husband is typically the grilling pro in our house, and is a stickler about keeping whatever we are grilling from drying out.  With lean meats like chicken breast, this can be a challenge.  If you aren’t the grilling pro that my husband is, do what I did and invest in a good meat thermometer to help avoid leather-like results.

Using just a half an ounce of cheese per serving adds a ton of great flavor while adding about 90 mg of sodium.  If you need a lower sodium version of this meal, it would still taste great without the cheese.

Green Chile Grilled Chicken

Print Recipe

Pin Recipe

★★★★★

5 from 2 reviews

Lime and garlic marinated grilled chicken topped with fried roasted green chilies, melted cheese, and fresh sliced jalapeno.

SODIUM COUNT: 806 mg in the whole recipe; 201.4 per serving

• Prep Time: 30 minutes
• Cook Time: 30 minutes
• Total Time: 1 hour
• Yield: 4 pieces 1x

Ingredients

Scale 1x2x3x

Marinade & Chicken

• 1 small lime ((juiced))
• 1 clove garlic ((minced))
• 1 Tbsp olive oil
• fresh ground black pepper ((to taste))
• 24 oz boneless, skinless chicken breasts ((trimmed and pounded to 1/4″ to 1/2″ inch thickness))

Toppings

• 2 fire roasted green chiles ((see post from September 11, 2016))
• 2 ounces cheddar cheese ((finely shredded))
• 1 small jalapeno ((sliced))

Cook Mode Prevent your screen from going dark

Instructions

Prep the Chicken

1. In a large ziploc bag, place the lime juice, minced garlic, olive oil, pepper and chicken. Marinate the chicken for at least 30 minutes or up to overnight.

Grill the Chicken

1. When ready to grill, preheat the grill to medium heat. Grill the chicken for 8-10 minutes per side, or until cooked through.
2. During the last two minutes of cooking, evenly top the chicken with the green chiles and cheddar. When the chicken is cooked and the cheese is melted, remove from the grill.
3. Serve topped with sliced jalapeno. 

Notes

NUTRITIONAL INFORMATION Yield: 4 servings Amount per serving: Sodium: 201.4 mg Calories: 323.0 Total Fat: 13.7 g Saturated Fat: 4.5 g Cholesterol: 113.6 mg Carbohydrates: 4.9 g Fiber: 1.4 g Sugar: 2.1 g Protein: 43.6 g

We get super wimpy peppers in Montana, so this dish is not overly spicy when I make it.  If you live in a region with better peppers than we do, you may want to test your peppers before you smother the chicken with them just to make sure that they are not too spicy.