Spice Up Your Saturday With Teriyaki Chicken Pineapple Boat

If you have been following me, you may remember my pineapple rice recipe. Because it is one of the most read recipes on my blog, I thought I could try another variant of it, and then throw in some chicken of good measure. I love teriyaki chicken, especially because it is one of those really simple, yet delicious things to do.

You will notice that most of the ingredients for this recipe are easy to come by (if you do not have them already in your home). An immersion blender (or any blender) will also do wonders for you, but even without one, you can still manually extract juice out of the pineapple. You need the juice because besides the flavour, it also adds sweetness to your rice. I got the original recipe from the Internet, you will notice I added a bit of sugar but, on second thought, you do not really need it because our pineapples are sweet enough.

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Total Time: 35 minutes

INGREDIENTS

• 1 cup rice
• 1 medium-size pineapple
• 1 cup water
• ½ teaspoon salt
• ¼ teaspoon chili flakes
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 1 teaspoon sugar

CHICKEN

• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• ¼ cup soy sauce
• ¼ cup honey
• 3 tablespoons vinegar
• ½ teaspoon fresh ginger
• 500g chicken fillet diced in 1-inch pieces
• 2 teaspoon butter
• 2 teaspoons sesame seeds

DIRECTIONS

1. Cut the pineapple into two equal halves, lengthwise. Then scoop out the pulp, leaving an inch of thickness along the edges. Blend the extracted pulp into juice.
2. Combine one cup of the blended pineapple juice with the water, salt, chili flakes, butter and sugar in a saucepan, and bring to a boil over medium-high heat then add the rice and simmer on low heat. Alternatively, just cook this in a rice cooker.
3. While the rice is cooking, blend the garlic, soy sauce, honey, vinegar, and ginger to make a marinade sauce. Add the marinade to the chopped chicken and let it marinate for at least 30 minutes (or overnight).
4. Heat the butter in a large sauté pan over medium-high heat. Drain the chicken from the marinade and add it to the pan, sear till it browns on all sides.
5. When the chicken is well browned and fully cooked, add the marinade to the pan and cook until the sauce has reduced and thickened then sprinkle with sesame seeds.
6. Using a spoon, serve the pineapple rice into the pineapple boat, topped with the teriyaki chicken.