I tried a new recipe today, Sesame Chicken and Rice. It is a primal recipe, so of course, it wasn’t made out of real rice. It was made out of cauliflower rice, which is basically ground up cauliflower cooked with chicken broth, onions, and garlic.
It was a very complicated recipe – one that caused me to use the majority of dishes in our kitchen – even all of the ice cube trays. First you have to stuff a chicken full of seasonings, then boil it for 1/2 an hour, than plunge it into a cold water bath, then rub it down with sesame oil, then let it cool, then chop it up into pieces. I ended up pulling off the skin because it looked gross, so it seemed pointless to have rubbed it all over with expensive sesame oil.
Between these steps you have to mix up 7 or so ingredients to make a “fiery ginger sauce.” You also need to chop up ingredients for and cook the cauliflower rice.
The recipe was a lot of work, and while the chicken tasted ok, and I liked the ginger sauce, the tastiness of these items did not equal the amount of work that went into creating them.
The cauliflower rice gave me fits, too. I couldn’t get all the liquid to cook off, so it was pretty runny. Even being runny, at first it tasted really good, but the more I ate it, the more it grossed me out. This is the second time I’ve cooked cauliflower in the guise of something else. I’ve also made cauliflower “mashed potatoes.” Those, too, at first tasted delicious, but the more I ate them, the less I liked them. I am crossing cauliflower cooked as other foods off my list.
So, this is the second recipe I’ve tried and tossed. But, at least we are trying new things and experimenting. Most of the meal will be edible tomorrow too. I can put the chicken on a salad and use the ginger sauce as salad dressing – add some avocado, and it will be delicious. I also saved the chicken broth, so we’ll probably make a nice primal soup with it – add some carrots, celery, onions, and cabbage.
