Recipe: Jambalaya Rice

Jambalaya is not one of the first things people think of when cooking a pot luck meal in Hong Kong. Yet it’s full of flavour, and the perfect recipe for success if you’re out to feed an army. This highly nutritious dish will have you set for 2 or 20, and you can customise it with any fillings you like. There’s a lot of ingredients going in, and that means a lot of exciting flavours with each mouthful. So even though it’s just one dish, Jambalaya tastes like a dozen all jam-packed together. A word of warning though… like all good things, it does take a really long time to make correctly.

Recipe: Jambalaya Rice

Servings: 10

Ingredients

For the marinade
– 40ml soy sauce
– 2 tsp dried thyme
– 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
– 2 tsp paprika
– 1/2 medium onion, chopped
– 1 tsp ground black peppercorns
– 1/2 tsp crushed green peppercorns
– 1/4 tsp ground dried lime (substitute with 1/4 tsp lime juice)
– 3 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves

The rest of the ingredients
– 60-80 grams of bacon, cut into small pieces
– 1 medium sized onion, diced
– 2 minced garlic cloves
– 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
– 1/2 pound chorizo, sliced into chunks
– 1/2 pound cooked ham, cut into 1/2 inch pieces
– 2 tsp dried thyme
– 1 tsp cayenne pepper
– 1 cup chicken stock
– 600ml canned peeled and diced tomatoes with juice
– 1 green bell pepper, chopped
– 1.5 cups uncooked white rice
– 2 pounds medium shrimp, peeled and deveined

Cooking method

1. For the marinade, in a large shallow baking dish, mix together the marinade ingredients, and place the chicken in the middle of the marinade.
2. Mix well until the ingredients are evenly mixed and coating the chicken breasts. Refrigerate for at least 2-3 hours.
3. Saute the bacon on medium heat until it starts to brown
4. Add the diced onion and minced garlic, keep stirring and cooking for another 2-3 minutes until the onion starts to soften.
5. Mix in the flour and chorizo. Stir and then add the ham, dried thyme, cayenne pepper, chicken stock, tomatoes, bell pepper and bring to a boil.
6. Stir in the rice, then cover and let the rice cook.
7. Check on the rice after about 20 minutes, and fluff with a fork to make sure it’s cooked.
8. Let the rice cool down and keep in the refrigerator until the chicken has finished marinading.
9. Remove the chicken marinade and rice from the fridge. Preheat the oven to 250 degrees C.
10. Discard the marinade, and bake the chicken until firm, about 10-12 minutes.
11. Remove, let it cool down and slice into bite-size pieces.
12. Lower the temperature of the oven down to 140C and place your covered Jambalaya on a large baking tray filled with water.
13. Bake until it warms up, should be about 30 – 45 minutes.
14. In a large saucepan, boil water and add the shrimp to the water. Cook for 3 minutes until they’re well cooked, then drain out the shrimp.
15. Mix in the shrimp and chicken into your jambalaya mixture, and serve piping hot.