This is a very simple recipe ideal for mid-week and when you might have left overs hanging about. It’s a “dry” rice dish (unlike risotto which is often quite wet) that uses the paprika oil that comes from cooking chorizo to moisten the food. It takes just a few minutes to prepare and cook, and is good and filling after a busy day.
Ingredients
- A large chicken breast, cut into bite-sized pieces. Or you could equally use leftover roast chicken or turkey – an excellent way to use up the Christmas left overs.
- A chorizo ring, sliced.
- An onion, diced. I used white because that’s what I had in, but I think this would be even better with a red onion instead.
- Some other vegetables cut up into small pieces or sliced (think eating with a fork and spoon, not a knife). I used baby courgette and baby corn because it made a nice change to peppers and mushrooms. And remember, a colourful meal is a healthy meal!
- Rice, already cooked – I used 100g basmati rice for the two of us that I’d cooked earlier in the afternoon, but you could equally use on of those cheating rice pouches straight from the packet.
- Salt and pepper to taste.
Method
Heat some oil in a large non-stick pan (you will be frying rice shortly, so make sure it’s non-stick!) and sweat the onion over a low heat for five minutes until soft. Turn the heat up, add the chicken, and cook until, well, cooked. If you’re using pre-cooked left overs just heat for a minute or two.
Add the sliced chorizo and stir through, allowing some of the red coloured oil to come out of the sausage before adding the rest of your vegetables and cooking for two or three minutes until they have started to soften.
Stir through the rice so everything is coated in cooking juices. If you boiled the rice and let it go cold you will need to break up the inevitable massive lump of rice with your fingers or a fork before adding it as it’s quite difficult to do once the rice is in the pan. Once everything is nice and hot, serve up in bowls and tuck in.
Enjoy!
