Fun fact about me: I love meat. I really, really do.
I don’t think I’ve ever made a vegetarian meal in my life (at least willingly).
While I enjoy eating and cooking copious amounts of meat, I find that chicken is always at the bottom of the list of meats I make. It’s a little boring to me and prefer playing with red meats.
However, every once in a while a very silly craving for chicken will hit me and it won’t go away until I have done with it what my soul desires.
Thus we have this post.
I wanted chicken, I wanted Caribbean food and I wanted it immediately.
So I made it.
Ingredients used:
- Chicken thighs
- Seasonings
- Vegetable oil – 1tbsp
- 3 cloves of garlic (chopped into fine pieces)
- 2 stock cubes (maggi/knorr)
- Crushed habanero chilli flakes or 2 scotch bonnets
- Jerk seasoning (Dunns River is my favourite to use)
- Thyme
- Salt
- 3 cups of rice (any type is fine- I only had basmati available)
- 1 can of red kidney beans
- 1 can of coconut milk
Prep time – 15 mins
Method (chicken):
- This step is optional but I always wash all my meat in warm water with a splash of vinegar
- Put the chicken, vegetable oil, half the chopped garlic, stock cubes, chilli flakes/scotch bonnets and jerk seasoning into a mixing bowl and mix together until all the chicken is covered.
- Leave to marinate for 10 minutes.
Method (rice):
- Wash the rice by putting the rice in a bowl, submerging in warm water and stirring. Tilt the bowl to pour out the starchy water. Repeat this step until the water remains clear.
- Put the rice in a large saucepan.
- Pour the red kidney beans into the saucepan.
- Use a measuring cup to pour the coconut milk into the saucepan. (It’s usually about 2 cups). This step is important because you will subtract this number from the amount of water you put in the rice.
- Season with salt, thyme and the remaining garlic.
Cooking time for rice – 20 minutes
Cooking time for the chicken – 30 minutes
Cooking the chicken:
- Preheat the oven to 190 degrees(gas mark 5)
- Place the chicken on a foil-lined oven tray skin side down and leave to bake for 15 minutes.
- Turn the chicken thighs so the skin is facing upwards and leave to cook for a further 15 minutes.
- Remove from oven once the juices run clear and the skin is nice and crispy.
Cooking the rice:
(For every cup of rice, use 1.5 cups of water to cook)
- Boil water in a kettle
- Add the boiling water to the rice (subtracting the number of cups that was used to add the coconut milk- so if 4.5 cups of water is needed to cook 3 cups of rice, and 2 cups of coconut milk was added to the rice, only 2.5 cups of water needs to be added to the rice).
Who knew cooking required so much maths? - Once the rice starts to boil, lower the heat and cover the saucepan with a tight fitting lid.
- Leave the rice to simmer for about 15-18 minutes then remove for heat and leave to steam in the saucepan for a further 2-5 minutes..
- Use a fork to fluff the rice and mix the kidney beans throughout.
- Serve.
Extra tip: use the stock from the chicken as a sauce for the rice.