Easy Chicken Porrige, the Comfort Food for All Ages 简易鸡丝粥，老少咸宜

The weather had been really bad lately, hazy, dusty and crazily hot that none of us feel like stepping out of the house. We opt to stay indoor unless we really have to go out. To make life easy, I decided to cook this simple chicken porridge with the leftover salted chicken prepared by my mom in law the night before. Since the chicken is already salted, I only used small amount of seasoning.

Preparation: 5 Minutes
Cooking: 30 Minutes (using uncooked rice) / 15 Minutes (using cooked rice)
Serving for: 3-4 person

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cup rice (soak in water for at least 30 minutes before cooking)
Water (rice to water ratio of 1:6)
1 salted chicken breast / 2 chicken thighs (precooked)
A pinch of salt & pepper to taste
Few drops of sesame oil
Some spring onions, roughly chopped

The Making:
1. Using a fork or cleaned hands, pull out the meat from the chicken breast, the finer the better. Set them aside.

2. Soak the rice in a pot of water, bring to boil and let it continue to cook on high heat for about 5 minutes. (You may add the chicken carcass into the water and you have a chicken broth base)

3. Turn the heat to medium, let it simmer for about 30 minutes or until the rice all soften, keep the lid open. Stir the porridge occasionally to avoid them from sticking to the bottom of the pot, if it becomes to thick just add a bit more warm water.

4. Add in the pulled meat, let it cook for another 3 minutes, finally add some salt and pepper to taste.

To serve, add few drops of the sesame oil, sprinkle with some chopped spring onions or anchovies powder. Since I'm out of both, I sprinkled with some roasted anchovies for my duo while for myself, I topped mine with some crispy chicken floss, my favorite!


It's a simple yet nutritious meal for the lazy afternoon and I got to enjoy some leisure time with my duo while the porridge was cooking.. The little ones happily gobbled down 2 bowls each without needing any assistant, if only every meal is like this. *wishful thinking of a rather tired mom*


Just a note on the choice of rice..
I used brown long grain rice which is unbleached, more flavourful and has higher nutritional value, you may just use normal white rice depending your preference. When baby C was younger, I prepared her rice cereal / porridge using Pearl rice which is a type of short grain rice with soft texture.

You may read more about the benefit of brown rice here, it is really more than just the different in color.


Useful Tips!

• To shorten the cooking time and to achieve softer texture, you may pre-soak the rice with water for at least 30 minutes or longer. Otherwise, you may have to increase the cooking time accordingly. If you are using left over rice, you can also reduce the cooking time to about 15 minutes.
• The porridge will continue to absorb water if you left it in the pot, so it's best to consume while it's warm or it may dry up.
• This is an ideal way to used up left over meat, you may substitute the salted chicken with roasted chicken too.