Chicken and chorizo jambalaya

A while ago I stole a delicious chorizo carbonara recipe off Jamie Oliver.

It left me thinking. What do you do if you have left over chorizo? Or what do you cook if you just really, really love chorizo? If you dream chorizo dreams on a daily basis?

Then, my memory stumbled across a simple, one-pot meal I’d seen on BBC Good Food for chicken and chorizo jambalaya. Easy and cheap to make. (Students take note!)

A plan was hatched. Ingredients were bought. A dish concocted.

This chicken and chorizo jambalaya is a hybrid between BBC Good Food’s recipe and Kitchen Geekery’s recipe.

Time: approx. 1 hour

Serves: 4, or keeps one student fed for a couple of days

Ingredients:

• 2 chicken breasts, chopped
• 1 onion
• 1 red pepper, thinly sliced
• 500ml chicken stock
• Chorizo, as much as you desire (I used ~80g, but could’ve upped it to 100g)
• 400g plum tomatoes (chopped are also fine)
• 250g basmati/long grain rice
• 2 garlic cloves, crushed
• 1 tbsp. cajun seasoning
• 1 tsp. chilli powder (optional / increase if you like things HOT)
• 2 tsp. paprika (I only used 1 but 2 would have been better)
• 1 tsp. cumin

Method:

1. Fry the chicken until sealed. Remove and set aside.
2. Fry the onion until it starts to soften.
3. Add the chorizo, garlic, pepper, and the cajun seasoning, and fry for another 5 minutes.
4. Add the rice, tomatoes, chicken,  chilli powder, paprika, cumin, and the chicken stock (ie. add everything else that you haven’t already added!)
5. Simmer for 30 minutes or so, until the rice has cooked and soaked up the flavours. Your dish should be a beautiful yellow-orange, with flashes of red.

I personally found this dish to be greatly improved the next day. If anyone has any recommendations for an alternative recipe, let me know 🙂

Author: Phoebe Amoroso

Phoebe Amoroso is a Tokyo-based reporter, multimedia journalist and storyteller. Hailing from the UK, she moved to Japan in 2014 and has since been shouting about the country to all who will listen. She divides her time between covering breaking news and producing feature stories for TV; writing about everything from business and tech to food and travel; and guiding hungry visitors who want to sample the best of Japanese cuisine. When not working and/or eating, she can often be found running up a mountain or cycling by the sea. View all posts by Phoebe Amoroso