Chicken Pulau with Mint and Coriander Raita

Rice is always a favourite in our house, and even more so since I've been experimenting with some new recipes. This chicken pulau has become a staple here, and we're serving it up at least once a week - normally with a simple salad and raita although in these pictures I made up some potato and spinach pakoras with some pakora flour I was given from a friend, and this tandoori popcorn chicken. It was so good! The recipe for the pulau is based on this one but I adapted the recipe somewhat to make it healthier as I recently started following Slimming World and wanted to make this dish free on the plan.



Chicken Pulao

Ingredients:

300g white basmati rice
1 onion
3 cloves garlic
½ green chilli (omit or add more to taste)
1 chicken stock cube
1 tbsp cumin seeds
1 chicken breast

Method:

Put rice to soak in a bowl filled with warm water for 20-30 minutes

Finely dice the onion, garlic and chilli

Fry onions, garlic, chilli and cumin seeds in a saucepan with frylight or other low calorie cooking spray. If the onions start to stick, then add a splash of water. You want the onions to get nice and dark but without burning them

Finely dice chicken

Make up stock cube with 330ml boiling water

Drain and rinse rice

Add chicken to pan and stir to seal the chicken

Add the rice to the pan. Don't stir, but flatten it all down so it makes one even layer across the bottom of the pan

Add the stock

Cover the pan with a lid, and turn the heat onto high until the liquid begins to boil

Turn the heat down to the lowest flame

Now, step away from the pan! Don't be tempted to stir it. You need  to leave it, covered, until all the water has evaporated. It usually takes about 10 minutes, but I have a glass lid for my pan so I can see through to see when all the water has gone. When I can see that all the water has been absorbed, I sometimes crack the lid a tiny bit and using a fork, taste some of the rice to make sure it's done. Then I set the lid back on for five more minutes.

Stir everything through, and serve!

Coriander and Mint Raita

Ingredients:

1 tbsp mint sauce
Small bunch fresh coriander
250ml fat free natural yoghurt

Method:

Roughly chop coriander, stalks and leaves

Add yoghurt, mint and coriander to a food processor with a pinch of salt

Blend until smooth