Apricot Curried Rice with Chicken

HeatherFeather's Note:

A easy & fast recipe I found in "Schoener Essen", a German cooking magazine. German food is often very mild, so if you like things with a little more kick, feel free to experiment with spicier ingredients.

• Total Time: 30 mins
• Prep Time: 10 mins
• Cook Time: 20 mins

Ingredients:

Servings: 4

• 250 g Minute Rice (amount is for uncooked)
• 1 large red bell pepper, seeded,cut in 2 cm pieces
• 1 bunch green onion, in 3 cm long slices
• 300 g fresh apricots, stoned and quartered
• 4 boneless skinless chicken breast halves (about 700 grams)
• salt and pepper, to taste
• canola oil (as needed)
• 4 tablespoons sweet and sour chili sauce
• 3 -4 teaspoons mild curry powder
• 200 ml clear vegetable stock
• 300 g frozen peas, thawed

Directions:

1. Cook rice and keep warm according to package directions.
2. Season chicken breasts with a little salt& pepper to taste.
3. Heat 2 tsp oil in a heated skillet.
4. Add chicken breasts and brown 3 minutes per side, then remove from the pan.
5. Spread chili sauce all over both sides of the chicken.
6. Place chicken into a heavy,ovensafe pan and place in a preheated oven at 200 C on the second rack, and roast for 10 minutes or until chicken is cooked through (the thicker your chicken breasts, the longer it will take).
7. In the same pan you cooked the chicken in, heat another 2 tsp of oil.
8. Saute the green onions and the peppers for about 3 minutes, remove from the pan to a dish.
9. Add another tsp of oil (if needed) and saute the apricots 1-2 minutes, then remove to the same dish as the peppers and the onions.
10. Add another tsp of oil (if needed), and saute the rice and the curry powder, stirring constantly to mix well, for about 2 minutes.
11. Pour in the stock and bring to a boil.
12. Return all the sauteed vegetables and the apricots, along with the peas to the pan and cook together until heated.
13. Serve with the chicken.
14. Note*: If you prefer things more spicy, feel free to add some hot curry powder or use spicier chili sauce.
15. In Germany, sweet& sour chili sauce is usually more like the sweet& sour duck sauce you can buy from La Choy in the grocery stores in America- it has little bits of red bell pepper in it.

Reviews

[Sackville]

This was very tasty! I love chicken and apricots together. I actually had to use dried apricots, because I couldn't find fresh ones, but I soaked them in a bit of hot water before I used them and they worked out just fine. Thanks Heather :-)

[Georgiapea]

Delicious HF. Thanks so much for this recipe. I had some regular chili sauce around - so I went 3T sweet and 1T hot - which worked out well. The rice is beautiful - I meant to take a picture! Fantastic easy recipe - thank you very much!