Chicken "Fried" Quinoa and Brown Rice

One of our big pushes about eating healthy here at Grain Crazy is to incorporate healthier ingredients into foods you normally make. That's actually where a lot of our recipes come from. We take a recipe we love or we think we would love, and then we substitute healthier ingredients into it. Little steps can really add up.

Take Chicken Fried Rice. It basically qualifies as a comfort food at our house. But a bowl of fried empty carbs never really makes anyone feel good afterward. So I decided to tweak it. It's not really fried--it just calls for 1 tablespoon of olive oil--and it uses quinoa and brown rice instead of your typical white rice. Not a large change, but healthier nonetheless. Instead of empty carbs, you are now getting a powerhouse of fiber and amino acids. Awesome, huh? I thought the quinoa might change the texture too much for my picky husband, I was pleasantly surprised that it didn't affect the texture very much at all.


Ingredients

1/2 C uncooked quinoa
1 C uncooked brown rice
3 1/2 C water
1 T olive oil
1/2 C peas
1/2 C edamame
3 T low sodium soy sauce
1 C cooked chicken, chopped
1/2 onion, chopped (or 2 T dried chopped onions)
1 garlic clove, chopped (or 1/4 tsp garlic powder)
3 eggs


Directions

1. Pour rinsed quinoa, brown rice, and water in pot. Bring to a simmer and let cook until water is gone or rice and quinoa are tender, about 15 minutes.

2. In a large saucepan or wok, add cooked rice and quinoa, olive oil, peas, edamame, soy sauce, chopped chicken, onions, and garlic. Turn to low heat and stir together well.

3. Make a large hole in the middle of the mixture by pushing it to the sides. In the hole, crack eggs and scramble with a fork.

4. Let the eggs continue to cook without mixing them into the rice mixture until thoroughly cooked. Then mix the eggs into the mixture.

5. Remove from heat and serve. Makes about 4 1/2 C of "fried" rice. Lots for leftovers!

This would also be great with other vegetables you have on hand. You could shred carrots into the mixture, substitute snap peas for normal peas, or anything else you might like.