Halal Guys Chicken And Rice But Better

Look, I love a good halal cart chicken bowl. I just love this one better. This is the halal cart chicken bowl that you don't have to wait in line for and you control the power of the flavor, meaning you can do whatever you want with this. You can add stuff to it, you can take it away, you can just make one element of it, not the other element. But this is the blueprint to making a halal cart chicken bowl that is so good, it might have you rethinking ever going to another place again to pick up your own. So that being said, let's make this, shall we? We're going to start by marinating our meat. Then we'll make our rice and sauces, prep our accoutrement, cook the meat, assemble and serve. We have a beautiful chicken bowl that you can't have without chicken, obviously. So we're going to start with two pounds of chicken breast. Just kidding. What is this? Preschool? We're all adults here, okay? We use chicken thighs. Oh, I don't like dark meat. Shut up. All right, if you want to use chicken breast, you can. Two pounds of it. But the point is, chicken thighs are far better. They're juicier, they're extremely hard to overcook, but also there's so much more flavor and just fatty deliciousness that go way better with this bowl. If that hasn't convinced you, then fine, use your breast. So you're going to cut this chicken, honestly, just bite-sized pieces, however big your mouth is, right? So it could be half inch pieces, could be one inch pieces. We're all going to go a little closer to maybe like three quarters of an inch, half inch, just something kind of small. So it's just easy to pick up with a fork and toss in your mouth. So throw that into a bowl. Then I want you to repeat that with all of your chicken thigh. So once that's done, we're going to add one tablespoon plus one teaspoon of kosher salt. Half a teaspoon of turmeric. Two teaspoons of ground cumin. One teaspoon of ground coriander. Half a teaspoon of fresh ground black peppercorn. Two teaspoons of smoked paprika. Half a teaspoon of cayenne. I know there's a lot, trust me here. One teaspoon of dried oregano. Three tablespoons of lemon juice. And optionally, if you want, a quarter cup of a nice quality harissa. Then you're just going to get in there with a glove or your bare hands. Doesn't really matter, just wash your hands. I want you to massage that and almost like knead it like a nice dough until everything's thoroughly coated. Make sure to get underneath, fold over. Get underneath, fold over. Squeeze it all together. It's super important that you get this sort of marinade evenly spread over every single piece of chicken because when it's marinating, anything that's not covered in the marinade will not marinate, at least not well. Look at this, it's like a beautiful, rich red. Smells amazing. It looks spicy, but I promise you it is not too spicy at all. You can always omit the cayenne if you're really worried about it. You could even omit the harissa if you're really worried about it. Now, just don't be a baby, come on. Cover that with plastic wrap. And you can cook this right away if you want, if you don't have time. But if you think ahead, set this in the fridge to marinate at least overnight, up to two days though. If you're going to make rice, the first thing you need to do is make the rice, which really means to wash the rice. So we have two cups of a nice basmati rice. I've got my rice cooker here. I'm just going to put it directly into the bowl, but I'm not going to cook it yet. I'm going to take it over to the sink. You're going to run some water in there. Fill it up like two times the amount of volume, but it doesn't matter. I just cover it with water. And then I want you to agitate the rice. Get it nice and cloudy and milky. And at this point, you'll carefully tip it out like this. Go nice and slow. Oh my God, the rice is going to fall out. Because of the friction of the rice up against the wall and the surface tension of the water, the water will actually pour out before the rice dumps out. A few grains might pop out, but it's fine. And then you're going to repeat that two to three times or until the water runs clear. So on the last one, dump the water out one final time. All right. So now I'm going to spread the rice so it's one even flat layer. No lumps that are higher than the other. I don't want a mountainous terrain in here. I want one flat plane. And then to this rice, we're going to add a combination of one teaspoon of turmeric, half a teaspoon of cumin, a quarter teaspoon of onion powder, half a teaspoon of garlic powder, half a teaspoon of MSG, and one and a half teaspoons of kosher salt. Then you're going to add equal parts chicken stock, not water, chicken stock. It's absolutely critical for the flavor, okay? You can even give it a little stir to make sure that everything's nicely incorporated. Nothing's getting left out. Place that in to your rice cooker and then turn that bad boy on. Let's make our sauces. There are two main sauces here that are extremely important. The white sauce, which is absolutely non-negotiable. But the sauce that everybody's afraid of, that I think is the key to perfecting this bowl, is the red sauce, the hot sauce. But oftentimes it's a little too spicy. We've mellowed ours out while maximizing the flavor. So we're going to start with small sauce pan, one cup of water, and 10 chili de arbol, dried, of course. You're going to crank the heat on high and then just bring that to a boil. You're going to boil that just until they're totally softened. It'll happen fast, like three to four minutes. Now, while that's boiling, you can come over to your blender here and you're going to add half a cup of harissa, which frankly, like harissa is not that spicy. It depends on which one you buy. There are many that are really sweet and smoky and not spicy at all. And there are some that are really, really spicy. So just make sure you find a brand that doesn't kill your taste buds. But this one, the spice level of this harissa, I'd give it like a two out of 10, three out of 10. It's not too hot at all. Oh, maybe a 3.5. One teaspoon of smoked paprika. Two teaspoons of sugar. That's going to sweeten it up, but it's also going to mellow it out. Three tablespoons of white distilled vinegar. Some acidity will also help mellow out the heat. And then two cloves of garlic. You can also up that to four if you want. And a generous pinch of salt. Now we're going to wait for our chili to arbol. All right, you'll know these are done boiling when they are just soft enough to tear easily. So if they don't tear easily, let them keep going until that happens. Now, once they're done, you're going to pour all of that, the chilies and all the water into your blender. And you're going to blend that on high speed until as smooth as possible. All right, once that's done being blended, I would not recommend breathing that in. Now, if you want it extra smooth, you could run this through a fine mesh sieve. You don't have to, but it will make the sauce look a little cleaner and less lumpy. That's something you care about. But there is an eating benefit, which is you won't be biting into actual seeds. So you put that through the fine mesh strainer and you just kind of push it through with the back end of a spoon until all of that's passed through. I mean, look, that works pretty good. You got all this sauce down here and then all that's left, that's all the seeds, the dried bits that didn't quite blend fully. And now that's out of your sauce and you're left with a beautiful, clean, smooth sauce. Dude, look how different that straining made this sauce look. Now, this is your opportunity to taste it and just make sure the salt levels are good. So if you want a little more salt, add it now. This is your last chance. All right, now the white sauce. A lot of people wonder what the white sauce is made out of and a lot of people think it's a yogurt sauce or something. Not really, no. It's pretty much just straight mayo. Look at the back of the packet. What is it, like 20 grams of fat? Most people are doing two of those, 40 grams of fat. You'll become a big dog if you start eating that too many times. That said, the first ingredient, three quarters of a cup of mayo. And this is where I got a little interesting here. I wanted sort of a creamy dairy element with a little bit of sourness, but not as sour as yogurt. So I went for sour cream, half a cup of sour cream. I also was thinking like, what do people have in their pantry? And my brain is like, oh, I really want to put creme fraiche, but not everyone has creme fraiche, but more people will probably have sour cream or at least easier access to it. Half a teaspoon of sugar just to curb a little bit of that acidity. Also bring a little bit of sweetness out of it. Half a teaspoon of MSG, generous pinch of salt, one and a half tablespoons of lemon juice and two teaspoons of vinegar. So that's bringing a citrusy-ness and it's bringing just straight, plain acidity. One clove of grated garlic and then just a little bit of fresh cracked black pepper. Give that a whisk until thoroughly combined. Now, if we did this correctly, this should look like white sauce. Wow, that actually looks exactly like it. Give it a little taste. I mean, that's kind of it. Season with a little more salt if it needs it, a little bit more pepper and that is a beautiful white sauce. That's it, super easy. Okay, next, the tomatoes. We're doing something a little bit different. You can just dice these and throw them in the bowl and you can just skip this part of the video, but I want to do something a little more special, okay? And it requires very little extra effort. You're already taking the effort to slice them, take an extra minute or less to do this next part. So first, obviously we're going to dice them. So remove their tops. Now, there's a few ways you can dice a tomato like this. One way I actually like that is a little sacrilegious is I want to cut out that sort of like core with all the seeds. I just don't need all that. You can keep it if you want, but I personally like to scrape out all that jelly. Like, that's gross, bro. It's just not the texture I want in this dish. And then just repeat that. So you cut along sort of the outside of it, kind of like you're unrolling a pepper and just kind of carve out that little core. And then any sort of jelly bits, you just kind of push out. Okay, now we can dice. So we just flatten those bad boys out and then now we can get a proper dice on these tomatoes. So you're going to cut them into half inch batons, then half inch the other way. All right, put those into a bowl. Now, like I said, you call it a day here. Just put them on your f***ing bowl. That's fine. But if you want to take an extra step while you finish assembling the rest of your bowl, it would be really nice if you season them with just a touch of salt and a little extra virgin olive oil to dress. Just give them a little toss. That's it. You don't need to do much. All this does is add a little bit of richness, add a little bit of seasoning to it. I always say season your tomatoes. These are now going to cure. They're going to marinate in their own salty juices. Okay, cooking our chicken. You can do this in a pan. You can do this on a grill. If you're going to do it on a grill, I would recommend doing a skewer so it doesn't fall through the grates. You could also do it on a flat top. Flat top works great for this kind of chicken, big pan, whatever. Do it in batches. Cook it in a single layer. I'll stop talking. Medium high heat, little bit of vegetable oil to coat. Then you're going to layer your chicken on, ideally in one even layer. You want to try to avoid, you know, just the chicken swimming in its own juices. Otherwise you won't get any real good color on it. All right. You can see how this is all in one even layer. Try not to mound them too much on top of each other. Otherwise you won't get any good color. Now you're going to let that sear for about two, three minutes, then we'll check it. After about one to two minutes, you want some nice maillard, maybe a little bit of char. A little bit of char is fine. Don't worry about it. Oh, it's burnt. No, no, no, it's fine. Now you're going to give it a flip, reduce the heat to medium, and then just let that finish cooking on the other side. You can continue to turn them and toss them until they're fully cooked through, at least a minimum temperature of 165 Fahrenheit. The beauty of thighs is you can let this continue to cook and they'll just get more tender. So it's really hard to overcook these. All right. Once your chicken is fully cooked, place that on a landing tray and repeat with the rest of your chicken. Now, once all your chicken is totally cooked, you're going to grate one clove of garlic over the chicken. This is optional. I would highly recommend it. And then you're just going to toss that together. All this is going to do is just add a ridiculous garlicky fragrance to this. That won't even taste like overwhelming garlic. It'll just add to the overall experience. I'm telling you. It's like mixing with the chicken fat and the spices. And it smells insane. It smells insane. Once your rice is done, pop that bad boy open. Look at that, dude. So first of all, look how beautiful this rice is. It smells absolutely beautiful. It smells fragrant of cumin and garlic. And there's just an unctuousness to it. I can't even describe. Now, while you're fluffing this, I do want you to add two tablespoons of cold, unsalted butter. Cut into little cubes so it melts a little more easily. So as you're fluffing it, what will happen is that butter is going to melt and enrobe this rice. So it's going to do two things. It's going to prevent the rice from sticking, but it's also going to taste really f***ing good. Just gently fold that to avoid breaking the rice too much. Now we're ready to serve. To serve, lay down a generous layer of your golden rice. Fold by a nice pile of your chicken, shredded lettuce, a spoonful of your seasoned tomatoes. You can also add a little more rice if you want. Now, you could serve your sauces on the side, but I much prefer to drizzle with each of your sauces. First, the white sauce and then the red sauce. Always go a little lighter on the red sauce because the more red you add, the spicier it'll get. Now just serve that with a few pieces of pita on the side if you like and enjoy. Look at this! Upon first glance, you might go, well, this just looks like a standard halal cart meal. And in many ways it is. I mean, that was the goal here, right? Except the goal is to make it so supremely delicious that you want to make it at home. But the other benefit is obviously you can make the individual elements. You could just make the rice. Anyway, I'll stop talking. Let's see how good it actually is. Get a little bit of everything. Guys, I know that we don't really do but better anymore. And this wasn't intended to be about better, but this is better than just about any halal cart meal I've ever had. It is so deeply, deeply flavorful. The chicken has a little bit of heat. It's so rich and unctuous. I actually, I like halal guys, right? But they specify no MSG. Big mistake. Second of all, I think that their chicken is a little bit subdued in flavor and it really relies on the sauce. This chicken stands alone, supremely flavorful. But then you throw this creamy, rich sauce, the spicy vinegary sauce. It comes together. It's just this like massive explosion of flavor. You're not missing a single beat. Seasoned perfectly. The rice is flavorful. The rice is an amazing texture. It's not overcooked like a lot of other places because the rice is sitting there all day. It's actually got some chew to it. And then the tomatoes are like bursting. I mean, these are just regular store-bought tomatoes, but these taste like some of the best tomatoes I've ever had just because they were seasoned a little bit. And then obviously the freshness from the lettuce. And all that is to say you have the pita too if you want pita, right? But honestly, this is so good. I don't even want it. I guess you could stuff it in here and wrap it and eat it if you want. But like, this is amazing on its own. So pita is optional, in my opinion. Pita. Oh, pita. Probably going to cut that, I hope. Kind of outdid ourselves on this one, guys. Recipe's in the link in the description. It's free for everybody. You can print it out, go get it. It's fine. I love you. Subscribe. Bye.