Recipe: Kiwi salsa and chicken burrito bowl

My latest food obsession is rice bowls. Yeah, pasta had its moment last year, but now it's all about rice. In a bowl. With other things. It started with burrito bowls, actually - still one of our favourite dinners, we have it at least once a week - and now we're branching out into other things-with-rice-in-bowls. I'm actually planning a post soon on my top three rice bowls, so look out for that if you're as excited by rice bowls as I am, which I am SURE you are.

This dish is a simple one, which came from making a recipe from Jamie Oliver's new book, Everyday Super Food. I am obsessed with this book - and bloody loved the TV show, too. It's just full of yummy recipes that happen to be healthy - rather than healthy recipes that happen to have no taste, which is ever so common. Just add some bloody seasoning, people.

Anyway, the original recipe is fish tacos with kiwi salsa, but as I don't eat fish, I made it with chicken instead one night. The tacos were pretty good - Jamie actually shows you how to make the wraps from scratch instead of buying them, which kind of appealed to me. The chicken needed more seasoning - that's on me - but the kiwi salsa... oh, the kiwi salsa. Jamie calls it game-changing, and he's right - it's flipping delicious.



The next time we made the salsa - less than a week later, we're obsessive people and also had kiwi fruits to use up - we had it as a rice bowl instead. Poached chicken, shredded and tossed in fajita seasoning, on top of fluffy basmati rice, alongside a big salad and crunchy red cabbage and topped with that sour-sweet salsa - oh, baby. It's up there as a serious contender to replace burrito bowls as my favourite dinner, although can anything replace my beloved guacamole? Time will tell.

Kiwi salsa and chicken rice bowl 

(adapted from Jamie Oliver)

Fajita Chicken and Rice

500g chicken breasts

100g white or brown rice

1 red pepper

1 onion

2 tbsp Old El Paso taco seasoning

2 cloves garlic

Kiwi Salsa

2 ripe kiwi fruits

4 spring onions

1 fresh green chilli

1 bunch of fresh coriander (approx 30g)

1 lime

Tabasco chipotle sauce

Red Cabbage Slaw

1/4 a small red cabbage

1 tbsp red wine vinegar

1/2 an orange

Salad, to serve

Serves 2

1. Put the chicken breasts - whole - in a saucepan large enough to hold them comfortably. Pour over enough water to cover the meat.
2. Bring the water to boil over a medium high heat, then reduce and cook for approximately 20 minutes until the chicken is cooked throughout. This makes super moist, simple chicken that shreds easily.
3. Put the rice on to cook according to the package instructions.
4. While the chicken is cooking, prepare your salsa. Peel the kiwis and chop in half, then place into a large dry non-stick frying pan on a medium heat with the spring onions (chopped), and the deseeded chilli.
5. Lightly scald it all, turning every now and then, and when the kiwi is golden around the edges place the lot into a blender with half the coriander, the juice of 1 lime and a few drops of chipotle Tabasco (sweet chilli would also work).
6. Blitz until smooth - I used my BlendActive - then taste and season with salt and pepper if needed.
7. As an optional side, slice the red cabbage, scrunch with the rest of the coriander, the vinegar and orange juice then season to perfection.
8. Finely chop the pepper and onion and add to the frying pan you used earlier until softened along with two cloves of crushed garlic.
9. Drain the chicken breasts and shred with two forks, then add to the frying pan with the vegetables and the taco seasoning - or whatever spices you fancy - and cook for a few minutes until combined and tasty.
10. Dish up with a big pile of salad, the red cabbage slaw, the rice and the chicken, and top it all with that delicious salsa. I have just realised Jamie Oliver is reading this out in my head.

The kiwi salsa works well for so many dishes - it went brilliantly with a spicy chorizo rice I made the other day - so put your own twist on it. But DO make it, because it's daaaaamn good.