Lemon Chicken with Herbed Rice

Another new recipe from What Katie Ate: Recipes and Other Bits and Pieces.

1 cup all-purpose flour, sifted
3 tbsp smoked paprika
Sea salt and freshly ground pepper
2 x 7 oz chicken breast fillets, cut into bite sized pieces
3 tbsp butter, melted
Green chile slices, to garnish (optional – don’t skip it if you can handle heat, it made it tastier)

Lemon Sauce

1/3 c soy sauce
3/4 c lemon juice (next time I would reduce this to 1/2 or 1/3 cup)
1/2 c Italian salad dressing
Finely grated zest of 1 lemon
2 large cloves of garlic, peeled and crushed
Sea salt and freshly ground pepper

Herbed Rice

1 tbsp olive oil
1 small onion, finely diced
2 c basmati rice, rinsed and drained (I used long grain jasmine rice, but I can see basmati being better with this)
2 scallions, trimmed and very thinly sliced
Small handful of flat leaf parsley, finely chopped
Sea salt and freshly ground pepper

Preheat oven to 425F.

To make lemon sauce, combine all ingredients with a pinch of salt and pepper and chill in fridge for 30 minutes (or more… I made this far in advance).

Mix together flour, paprika, salt, and pepper in a bowl. Toss the chicken pieces in the seasoned flour, then place in a shallow casserole dish. Brush each piece generously with the butter, then bake for 30 minutes. Turn the chicken pieces over and pour the chilled sauce evenly over the top, then reduce the oven temperature to 200F and bake for another 30 minutes or until chicken is cooked through but still tender.

Meanwhile, to prepare the herbed rice, heat the oil in a medium saucepan over medium heat, add the onion and saute for 5 minutes until soft. Add the rice and stir to coat. Cook for 1 minute, stirring often, then pour in enough boiling water to cover the rice by 3/4 inch. Turn the heat down very low, cover with a tight fitting lid and leave to cook for 10-12 minutes (do not stir at all), then turn off heat and leave the pan to stand, covered, for 10 minutes. Once cooked, fluff the rice up with a fork. Add the scallion and parsley and season generously with salt and pepper.

Spoon the rice onto plates, top with chicken and sauce, scatter with chile and serve. Serves 2.

Final Thoughts:

I like things really lemony, but this was too tangy from either the lemon juice or the Italian dressing or both; however, the next day, it was perfect. I used a pound and a half of chicken, so I had added a little bit more lemon juice, but it was still too much the day of. As noted, I will cut this down next time and replace the liquid with additional soy sauce. Grated ginger might be good in the sauce as well, and a side of quickly sautéed snow peas or mustard greens would go well with this. It was a fairly simple dish, tasty, but didn’t wow me. That said, I’ve had way less impressive at decent restaurants. With some tweaking, this could be pretty good. I will have to think on it!