Day 4 and we move to Central America
Day 4 of 2018 World Cup saw another busy day of football with three games taking place. I think I am putting a bit of a curse on the teams I am cooking dishes from as Costa Rica lost today. So four cooks and no winning team yet! To make things worse none of the teams have yet scored a goal. Today I cooked Arroz con pollo.
Arroz con pollo is basically chicken and rice, although there are quite a few other ingredients that go into it. There are basically 3 separate parts which are cooked and then combined towards the end of the cook. There is cooking the chicken, cooking the rice and cooking the sofrito mix. You then bring them all together at the end of the cook.
This dish seems to be very popular in Latin America in general, with different versions depending on which country you are in. I used the recipe from Pura Vida Moms, which made strong reference to Costa Rica and adapted for cooking on the BBQ.
The Verdict
This was quite a straight-forward cook although there are quite a few different ingredients. It really is a case of preparing everything and being organised, knowing the steps you need to go through to get to the point where you bring all the separate parts together. I have never eaten the original dish so it is difficult to know how I did. It was really tasty and the whole family cleared their plates. I didn’t serve anything with this but I think a nice tomato based salad would well with it.
Arroz con pollo
- Prep Time30 min
- Cook Time1 hr 30 min
- Total Time2 hr
Ingredients
For the Arroz con pollo
- 500g Long Grain White Rice
- 1ltr Chicken Stock
- 1 tsp Achiote Paste
- 1 1/2 tsp Salt
- 2 tbsp Rapeseed Oil
- 1 Rotisserie Chicken
- 1 tbsp Butter
- 400g Mixed Vegetables
- Handful Cilantro
- 1 Red Pepper finely chopped
- 1 Stalk of Celery finely chopped
- 1 Small Onion finely chopped
- 2 garlic cloves (crushed)
- 3 tbsp Tomato Ketchup
- 3 tbsp Soy Sauce
- 3 tbsp Salsa Lizano
Method
Start by lighting your BBQ, and setting it up to cook the chicken on the rotisserie. For guidance on how to do this check the recipe here. The chicken will take approximately 1 hour to cook.
Heat the oil in a large saucepan and then add the rice, salt, and achiote. Stir well making sure the rice is covered with the oil
Next, pour in the chicken stock. Bring to the boil, continuously stirring and then turn down to a medium heat, then stir occasionally so the rice does not stick.
While the rice is cooking, make your sofrito, which is the flavour base for the chicken. Add you wok or dutch oven to the BBQ and then melt the butter and then add the cilantro, red pepper, onion, celery and garlic and cook until soft. I also added a couple of cherry chunks to add some additional smoke.
Whilst the rice and sofrito are cooking, strip the meat from the chicken and place to one side. When the rice has absorbed all the liquid add both the rice and chicken to the sofrito mix and stir well.
Now add your mixed vegetables and again stir well into the mixture. Add the tomato ketchup, soy sauce, and Salsa Lizano to the mix it in thoroughly to the rice mixture. Cook for a further five minutes and then serve.
