My son is not your typical 7 year old when it comes to food. He has never eaten a hamburger or a hot dog. French fries are not his favorite food group. Vegetable dip? No way. His favorite foods are whole grain cereals, apples with peanut butter, fruit smoothies, and fruit leathers. Notice a pattern? I think the boy could live on sweet carbs. But, that doesn’t mean he isn’t without his salty, crunchy junk food cravings. And his most often requested salty crunchy junk food is chicken fingers. Thankfully, we’ve found a way to make them only slightly indulgent. By using nuts and cornmeal to coat the chicken, we get crunch without any added oil. Yay!

Prepping the Chicken Fingers

Gluten-Free Chicken Fingers

2 boneless skinless chicken breasts
1 clove garlic, minced
1/2 t. salt
generous grind of pepper
1/3 cup gluten-free cornmeal
1/3 cup finely chopped nuts (almonds or cashews are our preferred choices) – not ground, just chopped fine

Spray or oil a boiler-safe pan. Slice the chicken across the grain in “finger-size” pieces. In a shallow bowl, mix the rest of the ingredients together. Roll the chicken in the coating, pressing down to get coating to adhere to the chicken. Place the chicken on the pan. Broil on high heat until the top side is beginning to brown. Flip the pieces and broil until the second side is browned. (Broilers vary greatly in their heat output, so I’m not giving an actual time here. Watch carefully. It’s fairly quick in my oven – maybe 10-15 minutes total time.)

Chicken Fingers, Mashed Sweet Potatoes & Green Beans

We served our chicken fingers with mashed sweet potatoes and green beans with garlic and walnuts. A lot better than McDonald’s, eh?