Cook: Arroz con Pollo

At Antilles Elementary in Puerto Rico, the school lunch every day was black beans and rice. Every. Day. Sometimes I’d tell my mom that I was tired of the school lunch, and she would let me bring a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and a roll of fruit Lifesavers for dessert. And Thursday night I got nostalgic for that Latino Caribbean lunch. And finally was in a mood to cook and to get comfort and cozy because the weather was rainy. However, I had no black beans in my pantry, neither dry nor canned though I did find a package of yellow rice as well as the long grain white rice I was going to cook and these spice packets.   

I also had a lots and lots of bunching onions and peppers still from our late summer and fall garden.                        

And leftover rotisserie chicken as well as the bone and vegetable broth I made from it. I broke out the cast iron and olive oil and started preheating.             

I also got to chopping which took up most of the cooking of my Arroz con Pollo. And had found a recipe in our America’s Test Kitchen cookbook which has become my Joy of Cooking tome at this stage in my home cooking career.           

The recipe was only a rough guideline for this chicken and rice dish because I wasn’t going to marinade boneless and skinless chicken thighs required in the recipe. But the recipe made me remember the green olives, capers, and roasted red bell peppers in my refrigerator.                  

Mise en place, I was ready to sauté. First the white parts of the spring onions.         

Then the peppers. 

Then the toasting of the long grain rice and coating each of its grains in the oil. Next minced garlic and halved cherry tomatoes. 

And then I started cooking it like a risotto and adding the bone broth in stages for the rice to soak up and start steaming. And put in the contents of the spice packets to start coloring the dish red and yellow. And tasting. Always tasting. The rice was still too firm to the teeth, and so I covered it and let it simmer.

And then I was constantly lifting the lid to see if the rice soaked up more cooking liquid and tasting and biting the rice to see whether I needed to add more broth.

And I was easy on the salt. Only half a teaspoon. Because I knew. It was then time to add the salty bites of capers and green olives.

And let the rice simmer some more to meld all the flavors. Finally it was time to put in the rotisserie chicken and red bell peppers, which I didn't want to overcook, but let the dish heat through.

Serving time.

And one of the spice packets contained culantro, but fresh cilantro can only enhance the dish more and add that beautiful green pop of color. Cecilia, with whom I shared dinner, loved it. She said it was nothing like the arroz caldo she grew up eating. And I replied that this chicken and rice was not Filipino, but my version of Puerto Rican. No matter. We ate and enjoyed.