Monday night dinner- Ginger & Sesame poached chicken

I love this dish. It is a total one-pot wonder, and has become one of our standby meals for weekdays. And generally, I have all the ingredients for it in my kitchen already.

Need I say more? The cooking mags would probably call this a Monday night meal. Let's go with that.

This is originally from a Bill Granger recipe - he has introduced me to a wonderful range of Asian and Japanese flavours. I've now got condiments like miso and sake in my cupboard, along with peanut oil, sesame oil, soy sauce and birds eye chillis growing in my garden. Probably nothing stand out to many cooks, but something I would not have expected for me.

The method seems a little exact and complicated when I first made the dish, but is very obvious second time around. The rice is always perfectly cooked in this recipe, something that is not true of all the rice coming out of my kitchen. It's also fragrant with ginger and so moorish.  Enjoy!

Ingredients:
1 Tbs peanut oil
2 tsp sesame oil
1 small onion, finely chopped
2 garlic cloves, chopped
1 Tbs grated fresh ginger
200g jasmine/basmati rice
400ml chicken stock
250g chicken breast (roughly 1 breast)
Handful sliced spring onions
1 chopped red chilli
Soy sauce

Method:

Warm the peanut oil and sesame oil over a low-medium heat. Add the onion and cook for 5 minutes or so, until soft. Then add the garlic and ginger for 2 minutes.

Softening the onion

Pour in the rice, and cover evenly in the oil. Mix in the stock and bring to the boil. Then cover, reduce the heat to low and simmer for 5 minutes.

Rice simmering in the stock

Then delicately place the chicken on top of the rice, cover again and leave to simmer for 8-10 minutes.  Try not to check the chicken too often as you will let the heat out of the pan.

Set aside for a further 5 minutes (off the heat).

Serve sprinkled with spring onion, chilli and a drizzle of soy sauce along with the green veggies of your choice.