Tuesday, September 11, 2018

ONE-POT CHINESE CHICKEN AND RICE

ONE-POT CHINESE CHICKEN AND RICE
One-pot Chinese chicken and rice – an easy and flavourful recipe that’s going to become your new family favourite!
I woke up today full of plans to cook and photograph several recipes – my one resolution this year was to be more organised.
Well, this was very ambitious – and a little bit foolish – since today was quite possibly the dullest, darkest day ever. The sun didn’t stand a chance against the grey clouds and persistent rain. And my camera was practically laughing and pointing – ‘you want to photograph three recipes? Today? Ha!’
One of the recipes didn’t turn out well just to spite me – it was a meatloaf recipe that tasted delicious but looked simply awful.

The cake was a similar story – tasted amazing but the glaze technique I was trying is tricky and it didn’t quite work. Hoping to salvage it tomorrow though – it is a GOOD cake!
The last recipe was made out of necessity – I had chicken thighs that had to be cooked today. It wasn’t meant to be a blogpost.
But in desperation to salvage something out of my ambition I decided to photograph it anyway – using artificial lights.
It was simply too delicious to ignore and so easy – the kids surprised me by loving it and they are very hard to please.
I don’t often cook with chicken thighs that aren’t skinless and de-boned, but I must admit they taste a million times tastier.
Do remove some of the skin if there’s a lot and also some of the fat if the chicken is fatty. The marinade will make the chicken super-flavourful and the slow cooking very moist and tender.
I used my Le Crueset lidded shallow casserole for this which is perfect for one-pot meals.

ONE-POT CHINESE CHICKEN AND RICE
PREP TIME 15 MINS
COOK TIME 50 MINS
TOTAL TIME 1 HR 5 MINS

Course: Main Meal
Servings: 4 servings
Author: Lucy Parissi

INGREDIENTS
  • For the chicken
  • 8 chicken thighs skin on, bones in
  • 4 tbsp oyster sauce
  • 3 tbsp soy sauce
  • 3 tbsp runny honey
  • 2 large garlic cloves minced in a garlic press
  • 1 tbsp grated fresh ginger
  • 1 red chilli deseeded and finely chopped
  • salt and freshly ground pepper to season
  • 1 tbsp rapeseed canola oil to fry
  • –––
  • 200 g | 7oz brown basmati and wild rice
  • 500 ml | 2 cups chicken stock
  • 2 large shallots peeled and finely diced
  • 1/2 red bell pepper finely diced
  • 1/2 yellow bell pepper finely diced
  • 4 green onions scallions sliced thinly to garnish
  • 1 tbsp butter + 1 tbsp rapeseed canola oil to fry
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INSTRUCTIONS
  1. Put the chicken and all the marinade ingredients together in a bowl or large roasting bag and toss together. Leave to marinate for 2-3 hours or even overnight in the fridge (covered).
  2. Preheat the oven to 180C (350F).
  3. Remove the chicken from the marinade shaking most of it off. Reserve the marinade.
  4. Heat the oil in a large lidded casserole dish. Pan fry the chicken, skin side down first, over medium-high heat for a couple of minutes until golden. Turn over and cook for two more minutes on the other side and set aside. Wipe the pan clean.
  5. Heat the butter and oil and sweat the shallots for 7 minutes.
  6. Add the rice and peppers and stir to coat in the butter/oil. Add the reserved marinade and stock and bring to a simmer.
  7. Place the chicken over the rice and cover the casserole. Cook for 45-50 minutes or until the rice is cooked.
  8. Serve sprinkled with the chopped spring onions.
RECIPE NOTES
You can use white basmati rice or long grain rice but you might need to cook it for slightly less time.