Joe Wicks' tasty sage butter chicken recipe is the perfect weekday meal

Joe Wicks was a busy boy last year (and this year, to be fair). As well as keeping the nation moving with daily  PE with Joe sessions  on YouTube and launching The Body Coach Fitness App, he also penned a new book, which came out at the tail end of 2020. The 30 Day Kickstart Plan aims to help us build healthy habits and daily routines centred around how exercising regularly and eating well makes us feel, rather than how it makes us look.

Alongside exercise motivation and sleep advice, the book is crammed with 100 tasty, easy to follow recipes. The recipes are broken down into reduced-carb meals, post-workout meals and snacks. This sage butter chicken recipe, complete with lemony spring greens, sits in the reduced-carb section of the book and is pleasingly easy to make of a weekday evening.

Joe Wicks' sage butter chicken with lemony spring greens recipe

Ingredients:

1 x 200g skinless chicken breast fillet

A drizzle of olive oil

Salt and pepper

50g butter

A small handful of sage

1 clove garlic

100g asparagus tips

100g frozen peas

Pinch of dried chilli flakes

Juice of½ lemon

Green salad, to serve

Method

1. Place the chicken between two pieces of cling film or baking parchment on a chopping board. Using a rolling pin, meat mallet or any other blunt instrument, bash the chicken until it is about 1cm thick all over. Drizzle the chicken breast with a little olive oil, rubbing it into the flesh, and season with salt and pepper.

2. Melt 15g of the butter in a non-stick frying pan over a medium to high heat. When bubbling, carefully lay the chicken in the pan and fry for about 4 minutes.

3. Meanwhile pick the sage leaves and finely chop the garlic clove. When the chicken has had 4 minutes, flip it and fry for a further 4 minutes while you cook the greens.

4. Put the asparagus in a microwaveable bowl. Season with salt and pepper. Cover and zap on high for 2 minutes. Chuck in the peas and cook for a further 2 minutes until tender.

5. Come back to the chicken. Melt the remaining butter into the frying pan, add the sage leaves, chopped garlic and chilli flakes. Cook for 1 minute more, stirring, until the sage leaves are crisp. Take the pan off the heat; by now the chicken will be cooked through. Check by slicing into a thicker part to make sure the meat is white all the way through, with no raw pink bits left. Using a slotted spoon, remove the chicken and sage leaves onto a serving plate.

6. Put the frying pan back on a high heat. Chuck in the asparagus and peas. Cook for 30 seconds more until the veg is warmed through, then squeeze over the lemon juice. Pile the veg onto the plate alongside the chicken and spoon over all those unreal buttery juices. Serve with a green salad.

30 Day Kick Start Plan by Joe Wicks is available to buy now (Bluebird, £8.50)