Chicken pilaf recipe

Prepare this filling dish, chicken pilaf in just 10 minutes. Sprinkle with pistachios before serving.

Pilaf is a great way of using up leftover chicken; be it thighs, breast or a whole chicken. Flavoured with garlic, chilli, cumin, and cinnamon, this pilaf is bursting with flavour. Vegetables such as leek and carrot pack this dish with nutrients.

Ingredients

• 1 tbsp sunflower oil
• 1 red and 1 white onion, peeled and sliced
• 1 red chilli, halved, deseeded and finely sliced
• 1 clove garlic, crushed
• 2 tsp cumin seeds
• Good pinch of ground cinnamon
• 200g basmati rice
• 600ml hot chicken stock
• 16 ready-to-eat dried apricots, halved
• 4 or 6 cooked chicken thighs,skinned and boned(200-300g/7-10oz)
• 2-3 carrots, diced and steamed
• 1 leek, finely sliced
• Zest and juice of 1 orange, optional
• Handful of parsley leaves
• A few pistachios

Method

1. Heat oil in a frying pan. Fry the onion for 7 mins, until softened and browned. Spoon out a third of the onion and set aside for garnish.
2. Add the chilli, garlic, cumin seeds and cinnamon to the pan, cook for a min, then add the rice and stir well. Add the chicken stock and apricots. Bring to the boil, turn the heat down, cover and simmer for 10-15 mins, until the stock is absorbed. Don’t stir during cooking.
3. Add the shredded chicken and veg. Stir in orange zest and juice, if using. Warm through for 5 mins.
4. Serve topped with the crispy onions, parsley leaves and nuts.

Top tips for making chicken pilaf

This recipe uses chicken stock (opens in new tab); juices leftover from cooked chicken, but you could easily opt for a stock cube if you don’t have stock to hand.

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