Today (Jan. 16) is my wedding anniversary, so I thought I’d post a recipe that has some relevance to my husband and I. I made this for a 4th of July party that we attended together back in 2009, when we had only just started dating.
We actually had a terrible time at the party, and I remember the salad being a bit strange with my modifications, but everything seems to have worked out in the end. My second attempt at the salad turned out much better, as most things do in life after a bit of thought. 🙂
Obviously I told you my story of how I made it in the past, but I’ve never made it according to recipe, so that’ll be a slightly new experience, I guess.
Ingredients. My chicken is some pan-cooked frozen chicken thighs, seasoned only with salt and pepper. My rice is Thai jasmine rice.
Sautéeing the garlic.
Adding in the rice. I’ve talked before about how I dislike cooking rice on the stove, but I’ve been getting some practice in at work, and I think I’m getting better at it.
One of the things that’s helped me get better at stove-cooked rice is a tip I got from a former colleague back in my teaching days–place a rag on top of your pot and secure it with the lid, tucking the sides up to prevent fires/burning. This will create steam within the pot, and steam your rice.
There’s one catch though: DON’T OPEN THE POT UNTIL IT’S DONE. If you release the steam, it defeats the whole purpose. Resist the temptation to peek. Give it about 20-25 minutes before you even consider cracking it open.
Rice combined with peppers & celery.
The recipe doesn’t say to cut up the salami slices, but I quartered mine to make them a bit easier to eat within the salad. I like things to be roughly the same size in salads like this, when getting a bit of everything is part of eating it as intended.
Final shot with olive, tomato, and lemon garnish. They show the olives sliced in one picture and whole in another, so it’s up to you how you want them–I refer to my aforementioned size rule when I tell you that I sliced them. All in all, I think it went more successfully the second time than the first–what a difference some perspective makes. 🙂
Grade: A-
