Maple-Glazed Chicken with Cranberry Arugula Rice

Well, the kitchen is a complete disaster but it was well worth it because that was delicious. My husband gave it an A which is usually a very good thing. I have some tips for making it so I'm going to start by giving the recipe:

Maple-Glazed Chicken with Cranberry Arugula Rice (7-day Menu Planner for Dummies)

Ingredients

2 tablespoons butter

1/4 cup maple syrup

1/2 cup dried cranberries

2 cups grilled, sliced chicken breast

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon pepper

3 cups cooked brown rice

1 6-oz package (5 to 6 cups) fresh baby arugula or spinach

1/2 cup gorgonzola cheese, crumbled

Directions

• Cook brown rice! Takes about 30 minutes.
• Melt butter in a large (and I do mean large) nonstick skillet on medium. Stir in syrup and cranberries; cook for 1 minute. Add chicken, salt and pepper; cook 1 minute or until hot. Remove chicken using slotted spoon and set aside.
• Add rice and toss to coat; remove from heat.
• Toss in arugula (into pan with rice); spoon rice mixture onto platter. Top with chicken and cheese. Serve immediately.

Okay so now some notes on preparing this meal. It sort of turns out to be a salad with chicken, rice, cranberries and cheese. It is very tasty even though these are things I would never have thought to put together. I think that's what makes it so good. I need to think outside the box a little more when it comes to food. We fall into comfortable patterns that become boring which then drives us to pick up food after work just to mix things up. It's a vicous cycle.

I would definitely recommend an extra large skillet because once you put in the arugula, it becomes a bit tight. I used spinach instead of arugula because I couldn't find any. Also, I threw in a little bit more syrup and that worked out well since it was all gone by the end. For the grilled chicken, I ended up using some left over rotisserie chicken from Tuesday. I wouldn't recommend this. The chicken was all shredded and there were too many small pieces that I couldn't get it all out when the recipe told me to. If you don't want to grill the chicken yourself, you should be able to find pre-grilled chicken cut into pieces at the grocery store. I looked this time but couldn't find it. It's usually with the prepackaged deli meats. If you have trouble, I would just ask your deli counter.

Don't forget to cook the rice first. Being such a beginner, I've never actually cooked brown rice before (probably because I use white). I hadn't realized how long it takes! But the timing worked out ok because I started the skillet right before the rice was finished. Also, as for the cheese, I'm thinking you can do any kind of crumbled cheese you want (like feta). The gorgonzola was great though.

I didn't have a neat platter or anything so I used a pyrex 9x13 pan to put it all in.

Interesting looking right?

The final product

Bear was waiting by to clean up my mess

 

The aftermath

 All in all, I'd say this was a great night cooking!