New spin on Chinese takeout - Chicken Fried Rice

I like to change up what I’m cooking in the kitchen. Many people feel the same, but for me, it’s a little hard to move from my comfort zone. I know I can make a mean pasta sauce and pretty much put any pasta dish together with confidence. My family and I do enjoy Chinese food and even some dishes from Japan. Our problem is that we’re not big seafood eaters. Well, The Boy is, Bear and I really would prefer not to eat fish. I am not sure why it is this way, but I’ve never been a big fish fan apart from tuna and the occasional fish stick. Bear, well, there’s a slew of reasons why he doesn’t like most things and it’s just too numerous to mention.

Anytime there is an Asian recipe in one of magazines or sites I frequently read that combines flavors and tastes that I know we will all like, I’m anxious to give it a try. My limited experience in Asian is mainly re-creating our favorite takeout meals. I’ve just started creating my own sweet and sour sauce as well as my own stir fry sauce, but to be honest, I like the bottled stuff a bit better. It’s probably because I need to practice these things a bit more.

One dish that did catch my eye recently was out of Cooking Light’s most recent issue. It was a fried rice dish and since Bear LOVES fried rice, I thought this would be a good recipe to try out. It was hit. Even our niece/cousin (hard to explain how she’s related) loved it, since she was over hanging out before she went back to the University of Maine for her Spring semester.

I tweaked the recipe a bit for our own tastes and what I had on hand. I’ll note the changes, as I always do, in a different color. For those of you follow WW plan, one serving (serving size 1 ½ cups) is 8 points.

Cooking Light’s Southeast Asian Fried Rice (from the January/February 2010 issue)

1 tbsp brown sugar
1 tbsp fish sauce
1 tbsp less sodium soy sauce
1 tbsp fresh lime juice (about one lime)
1 tsp. chili paste
¼ tsp. salt – I omitted this, as usual. I felt that the soy sauce, bacon and fish sauce would have enough)
½ tbsp. Chinese 5 spice powder. – I added this myself. I felt to have flavor without extra salt this would do the trick. It worked.
2 large eggs – slightly beaten
1 bunch of scallions – I didn’t have scallions on hand the day I tried this out, so I used a small regular onion
2 tbsp peanut oil (I ended up using canola, because of the point value for WW)
2 ½ cups cooked brown rice (the original said for it to be “cooled” but mine was still slightly warm when I added it in)
¼ cup vertically sliced shallots
1 skinless, boneless chicken breast (I used about 8 chicken breast tenders that I had on hand and I think1they worked just as well)
2 skinless, boneless chicken thighs – I omitted this because I didn’t have it on hand. Also for the WW points, they were not added so if you do try it with the thigh meat, you have to add that in to the point value)
2 cups broccoli florets - I used carrots, because I didn’t have any broccoli. My family and I aren’t big fans
1 cup julienne sliced red bell pepper (I just used a whole red bell)
1 ½ tsp. minced garlic
2 bacon slices, cooked and crumbled
Cooking spray
4 lime wedges (we didn’t use them)


1. First thing I did was start the rice in the rice cooker and start the bacon. That way, both things could cook and cool down for when I needed them. While both of these items were working, I chopped the veggies up as well as the chicken tenders. Once this was done I began to prepare the sauces.

2. Whisk together the first 4 ingredient, ½ tsp. of chili paste and ½ tbsp of 5 spice powder in a bowl. In another small bowl combine eggs and remaining chili paste. If using the scallions, separate the green tops
and chop them diagonally and then chop the bottoms in 1” pieces. Set both aside.

3. After the bacon is done cooking, rinse and wipe clean the same skillet. Re-heat it over med-high heat and add 2 tsp of oil, swirling to coat the pan. Add the rice and stir fry for 1 ½ minutes. Transfer rice to a large bowl and then add another 2 tsp of oil in the pan. Add shallots to pan and stir fry for just 30 seconds or until tender. Add chicken and stir fry for 1 ½ minutes or until lightly browned. Add brown sugar mixture to pan, bring to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for about 1 minute or until the liquid thickens, stirring constantly. (Now you see why I did the bacon, rice and cutting of the veggies first, so I could pay attention to the stir-frying portion). Add chicken mixture to the rice bowl.

4. Wipe the pan clean and return to med-high heat. Add the remaining 2 tsp of oil (I also used the cooking spray at this point), Add veggies and stir fry for 3 minutes or until veggies are tender. Add garlic and scallions (if using) last, stir-fry until fragrant then add the chicken mixture to the pan again. Cook until chicken is done and everything is heated through then return it all to the large bowl

5. Hit the pan again with some cooking spray and add the egg mixture. Cook until the egg is just about set—I ended up just scrambling the egg up, didn’t seem to harm it any way. If you manage to NOT scramble the eggs up, transfer to a cutting board and cut up into pieces along with the bacon. Stir egg and bacon into the rice mix. Top with the green onion tops and if you like, the lime wedges (I chose not to)

This was a big hit and no one felt like they didn’t get enough to eat. It’s a great one-dish meal and an interesting take on regular fried-rice from the takeout place. Honestly, I like it better, because I’m not a huge fried-rice fan, but this recipe was good.  Enjoy!

Cilantro and Lime Chicken

I got this great recipe from Cooking Light. I learned from the WC Nesties that Cooking Light has great recipes so I bought the most recent issue on the newsstand and found a few new recipes I'd like to try. This one is Cilantro and Lime Chicken with Avocado Salsa. My guys aren't big fans of Avocado, so I left it out this time, but I did feel the salsa was lacking and I think I may sneak it in next time or maybe add some peppers. You can find the original recipe here: http://tinyurl.com/d4puwm

Cilantro and Lime Chicken with Tomato & Onion Salsa
Serves 4

For the chicken:
2 tbsp fresh cilantro minced
2 1/2 tbsp fresh lime juice
1 1/2 tbsp EVOO
4 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
Cooking spray
Old Bay Seasoning

Salsa (I made mine without the avocado)
2 Plum tomatoes diced
2 tbsp chopped onion (I kinda went overboard on this one. It worked for us though!)
2 tsp. fresh lime juice
Black pepper
Garlic powder* Oregano* *I added these two final ingredients because I felt that the salsa needed a little something*

Add the cilantro, oil and lime juice to a medium sized bowl. What it looks like before the chicken:
Next, add the chicken to the bowl and let sit for 3 minutes.

While the chicken is marinating you can start getting the salsa ingredients ready. Dice the tomatoes and onions. As you can see, I chopped a BIG onion and forgot that it was only supposed to be a few tablespoons of onion. However, since I cut the avocado out, my mistake worked out. Add the tomato and onion to a bowl. Add the black pepper, garlic powder and oregano and mix.


Next heat up your grill pan and spray with cooking spray. Add the chicken to the pan. Discard the marinade. I hit the chicken with a few dashed of Old Bay seasoning. I like to use something flavorful when I cook other than salt.

I love my grill pan. We received it as a Shower gift last year and it's come in handy for when we can't grill outside. Please ignore the "bald" spot on the one chicken breast. I accidentally brushed some of the seasoning off. Grill each side for about 5-7 minutes. Depending on how thick the chicken breast is.

Give the chicken a flip. Look at the pretty grill marks with the green cilantro. It smelled really good too. I didn't add any Old Bay to the other side. I just let them cook for another 5-7 minutes.


Toward the end of the second side cooking, I added some of the tomato and onion salsa to two of the breasts. I left two "plain" so Bear would eat them without complaint. Which he did.

The finished product. Two plain and one breast with the cooked tomato and onion on it.


I served this with Zataran's Spanish Rice mix. It complimented the chicken very well. I would've made my own Mexican rice, but I couldn't find a recipe that I could do. Maybe next time.

For Weight Watchers each serving of 1 breast with salsa and rice is 10 points. The chicken and salsa without the avocado is 3 points (4 points with the avocado) and the rice mix is 7 points for a 1/2 cup serving. I was shocked about that, but the rice is good so I followed the serving size. Here's a picture of what my dish looked like.

As I said, I was surprised by the serving size points for the rice, but I used my handy-dandy measuring cup and measured out the rice. Because of the chicken and tomatoes I did feel full after eating my dinner. I'm sure the water I drank with it helped too.

Enjoy!