A famous South Carolina Low Country dish is Chicken Pilau or Chicken Bog. It tends to be a gooey concoction of mainly chicken and rice usually with sausage and onions sauteed in bacon fat etc. It is the kind of meal that brings a smile to Paula Dean's face.
Now, no one is every going to accuse me of being Mr. Heart Healthy but I fixed a kinder,gentler version of a Rice Pilau that turned out pretty good.
This will feed four:
One small head of broccoli: just florets
Two cups (loosely packed) dried Chanterelle mushrooms
1/2 bell pepper chopped
One small onion chopped
One bay leaf
Two boneless chicken breasts
Two packs of Success Brown Rice
Take the broccoli and cook in boiling water until soft. Remove the broccoli from the water and put under cold water to stop the cooking. Do not throw the water away! While the broccoli is cooking, heat two/three cups of water in a measuring cup to almost boiling and add the Chanterelle mushrooms. Note: I buy my dried mushrooms at www.olivenation.com I have been buying stuff from them for years and I recommend them highly. Let the mushrooms reconstitute in the water (about 15 to 20 minutes). Remove the mushrooms from the water and pour the remaining mushroom stock into the pot of reserved broccoli stock.
Put one tablespoon of olive oil in a saute pan and brown the two chicken breast over medium-high heat. Once browned on both sides, remove the pan from the heat, take the chicken and coarsely chop and return to the pan. Add 1/4 teaspoon of salt and a teaspoon of fresh ground pepper. Return the pan to the stove and stir the chopped chicken over medium heat until cooked. Add a 1/4 cup of dry white wine to deglaze the pan and continue to cook until almost dry. Set the chicken aside.
Now....in a 12 inch skillet, heat two or three tablespoons of chicken fat.
What????? Did he say chicken fat?????
I have made it a practice of saving the fat whenever I cook some kind of beef or poultry. Beef, lamb, chicken, turkey whatever. I pour off the fat and freeze it.
If you are like most people, you don't have chicken fat in the fridge so simply use butter but IN THE FUTURE.......start saving your fat!
When the fat has melted, saute the onions, bell pepper and bay leaf over low heat for 15 to 20 minutes. This gives the bay leaf time to sweat and add flavor. Don't brown the onions.
While doing this, boil the reserved stock and cook the rice. (If there is not enough stock to cook the rice, add chicken broth).
While the rice is cooking, coarsely chop the mushrooms and add to the saute pan continuing to cook over low heat.
When the rice is cooked (10 minutes) remove from the water and drain.
Coarsely chop the broccoli and add it to the pan then add the chicken and then add the rice. (Don't simply dump both bags of rice....you may not want all that rice so dump the first bag and add as much of the second bag as you wish).
That's it!! Stir it and serve it!
Chicken Pilau purists will say this isn't Chicken Pilau and they will probably be right. It if makes you feel better, cook a bunch of bacon and saute the vegetables in the bacon grease and chop up the bacon and throw it in at the end with the rice and chicken.
Another alternative is to add some smoked sausage but now we are getting back to Paula Dean territory.
Try it my way.....no bacon or sausage. I think you will like it. Plus with brown rice and broccoli, you won't feel the need to go out and do something stupid like jog or work out.
What do I drink with this??
A lighter red wine such as Pinot Noir will stand up to this nicely. Most folks will want a white and if you have read my previous posts you know I abhor the nasty domestic chardonnays and think most pinot grigio is tasteless. So go with a white burgundy, whatever you can afford. But for a different taste, I would try a nice quality champagne.....I think you will be pleased with the match.
