Globecooking recipe :Jollof rice (Nigeria) #readcookeat

There wasn't much food mentioned in The Dragon Society by Olufunmi Omopariola Olayinka (click through to read my review) other than burgers and chips, but I did find one reference that had me scuttling off to google to investigate :

p25 "Precious Ojo's christening turned out to be a very big celebration at the A La Carte restaurant owned by her father, Bode Ojo [...] Steven noticed Carol filling her plate with pounded yam, vegetable soup and beef stew. He decided to settle for fried rice, jollof rice and fried plantain."

Wikipedia explains : "Jollof rice, also called Benachin (Wolof: "one pot"), is a one-pot rice dish popular in many West African countries, eaten whenever desired. It is a West African version of pilaf or paella, and possibly a progenitor of the Louisianian dish, jambalaya."

It's more of a concept than a specific recipe, so I looked at Jamie Oliver's Jollof Rice and a Jollof Rice with Chicken recipe on the BBC Good Food website for inspiration, before coming up with my own version based on the contents of the fridge.

Jollof Rice

ingredients :

6 chicken thighs (optional)

1 clove garlic

2 onions

1/2 red pepper

1/2 green pepper

1 cup leftover ratatouille (you could add any leftover cooked meat or vegetables)

1 tub cherry tomatoes

2 tomatoes

salt, pepper, spices (I used Ethiopian berberé spices but you could use chilli, ginger, cumin, nutmeg)

1 chicken stock cube

2tbsp tomato puree

2 cups rice

2 cups water

Put the chicken in a roasting tin. Grind over some salt and peper, drizzle with oil and put in the oven at 180°. (You could just leave this out for a vegetarian dish.)

First chop the garlic.

Then the onions and cook over a low heat in a drizzle of oil. They need to be soft but not browned.

If using up cooked vegetables or meat (I had some ratatouille), put it in a large pan.

Chop up the red and green peppers and tomatoes.

The chicken should be half cooked by now so toss in the cherry tomatoes. (I didn't have many left as I was winding down the fridge before visiting family !)

Add the red and green peppers and tomatoes to the pan. Add the stock cube and water and stir in the tomato puree and spices.

Toss in the rice and reduce the heat. Leave to cook for about 15 minutes until the rice is cooked and the liquid has been mostly absorbed.

Check the chicken is cooked through. 

Add the cherry tomatoes to the pan and give it all a good stir. (I also added the juices from the roasting tin for extra flavour.) Lay the chicken thighs on the top of the rice and serve.

*** Don't miss my country-by-country globecooking recipe index ! ***

Cooking the books to join in with Galina's #ReadCookEat linky at Chez Maximka.

As this cleared out the veg box of the fridge, I'm also linking it up to my #KitchenClearout linky.