I grew up on this dish. It has a little special place in my heart. And it occurred to me I could make it with my THRIVE! And save myself lots of time by so doing. Tonight, I had this dish simmering after 20 minutes (including my toddler's "help"). No joke. When I make it the traditional way -- without THRIVE -- I'm in the kitchen anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour.
Here's how THRIVE Life saved me that much time:
1. I didn't use raw chicken. This means I didn't have to clean the chicken or disinfect the counters when I was done. My THRIVE Chopped Chicken was ready for me to use, already cooked!
2. I didn't have to wash or chop my vegetables. This included celery, onion, cilantro, and bell pepper. Saved me 5 to 10 minutes right there!
3. I was able to skip the browning chicken step -- as well as the shredding chicken step. This is another 5 to 10 minutes, typically.
4. Though this didn't technically save me time in the kitchen (since I could be out of the kitchen while it was happening), it did save on how long it took to get dinner to the table: I didn't have to boil and cook the chicken.
In fact, this was ready in about 55 minutes (but only 20 of that was hands-on -- the rest was just letting the rice cook). When I make this dish for dinner without THRIVE, I plan for starting dinner 2 hours before I want to eat it. And even then, sometimes it takes longer.
So here's the recipe how I made it.
ARROZ CON POLLO/PANAMANIAN CHICKEN AND RICE
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 clove garlic, minced
2 tablespoons THRIVE Chopped Onions (freeze dried)
1/3 cup THRIVE Celery
1/3 cup THRIVE Mixed Bell Peppers
1 tablespoon THRIVE Cilantro
4 tablespoons THRIVE Tomato Powder
1 teaspoon salt*
6 1/2 cups water
3/4 cup THRIVE Chopped Chicken
1/2 teaspoon oregano*
1 1/2 cups white rice*
1/3 cup THRIVE Green Peas
1/3 cup THRIVE Carrot Dices (optional)
1/2 cup sliced green olives (optional)
Heat oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add minced garlic and give a quick stir. Toss in THRIVE Chopped Onions, THRIVE Celery, THRIVE Mixed Bell Peppers and THRIVE Cilantro. Give everything a little stir, then add 2 1/2 cups water. Stir in THRIVE Tomato Powder and salt. Add additional 4 cups of water, THRIVE Chopped Chicken, white rice, THRIVE Green Peas, and THRIVE Carrot Dices. Cover and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to simmer and allow to cook until water is absorbed and rice is done. Stir in green olives, if desired.
*Denotes other ingredients available through THRIVE Life.
So I'll be the first to admit this isn't exactly like the original traditional takes-a-long-time recipe. But it's close, and it saves me so much time! I'm excited to have found a way to make one of my favorite dishes more quickly and easily! It means I can put it on our dinner menu more frequently :).
A couple notes: you could add more chicken if you wanted. We just cut back on our meat consumption a lot, so that was plenty for us. If you do increase the chicken, you may want to increase the water a little bit too. And, as it is often difficult to "make up" a recipe (at least for me...), I learned that I needed to increase the water (I wrote the recipe the way it needs to be, not the way I made it. I had 1 less cup of water in mine and not all the rice got all the way cooked). And I forgot to include my THRIVE Cilantro in the picture. Grrr... Oh well ;). It's in the recipe, so that's what really counts!
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