Chinese Food – Fast  

March 19, 2008 | By john | No Comments »

Need “Chinese Food” fast? My Chinese recipe can be made in 15 minutes or less and if you’re tired of Hamburger Helper, Macaroni and Cheese, or Hot Dogs, – this is the quickest you can make some good Chinese food!

I’ve given you a lot of great recipes from scratch, and I have no problem taking 2-3 hours to make homemade bread or 90 minutes for a fresh pan of lasagna. But sometimes you are in a hurry. With 5 of us in our house (2 adults, 2 teens, and one baby) there are people coming and going all the time. School, doctor’s appointements, grocery shopping, paying bills – there’s only so much time in the day. And we out out waaaaay to much as it is. So, if I’m in a hurry I need to save time – but that doesn’t mean that I don’t want good food.

Today Kieli wanted Chinese food. I didn’t want to buy Chinese food, but I didn’t want to take forever to make it myself either. This recipe is for fast and “easy Chinese food” that tastes really good! You can take “box food” and make it into something awesome in just a few steps.

Ingredients for “Fast Chinese Food”:

  • 2 boxes Rice-a-Roni or Generic “Fried Rice”
  • 1 – 8 to 10 oz bag frozen Chinese vegetables
  • 1 – 8 to 10 oz bag frozen broccoli
  • About 1/3 bottle Teriyaki Marinade or Stir Fry Sauce
  • 4 Frozen Breaded Chicken Patties
  • 6 tbsp margarine
  • 4 cups hot water

You need a 2 quart pot and a large skillet. Put 6 tbsp of butter in the pot on high. From the boxed Rice-a-roni add the rice (only) once the butter starts to melt. Stir and mix well. Quickly drizzle the skillet with oil and place the 4 frozen chicken patties on med-high. While those cook, stir the rice and melted butter mixture constantly for about another 90 seconds. Then add 2 cups of hot water, mix well, and then add the 2 packets from the boxed rice and mix well. Add the remaining 2 cups hot water stir, and then place on med-high heat covered. You can turn the timer on for 10 minutes. Stir about every 3 minutes.

It should be about time to flip the chicken patties. Cook for about 2 minutes after turning, remove them from the pan to a cutting board, and put the teriyaki or stir fry sauce in the pan. Then empty the frozen veggies, and tightly cover the pan and turn the burner on just slightly under high heat. On the cutting board cut the chicken patties first in strips, and then the opposite way to get about 1/2″ squares. Then take the lid off the veggies pan, add the chicken squares, mix well, and re-cover. Also stir about every 2-3 minutes.

When the timer goes off on the rice, stir and then take a teaspoon out, cool, taste, and make sure the rice is tender and done. If it’s not or if there is significant liquid in the pan remaining it made need a few minutes more. Usually at this point it’s done. Turn off the burner, uncover and let stand for a minute or two. Check your veggies and make sure they are done. Turn off the pan and uncover. The last step is to spoon rice onto about 4 plates, and cover with the chicken and veggies mixture – and serve!

The nice thing about this recipe is that it’s versatile. Make it without the meat for a perfect “vegetarian chinese recipe”. You can also make it with regular breast of chicken instead of breaded chicken patties, but the point of making it this way is not only so it’s “quick chinese”, but also because the breading of the chicken soaks up the stir fry sauce, much like General Tso’s chicken – I believe it tastes better. That doesn’t mean, however, if I had leftover pork chops in the fridge that I couldn’t have just as quickly made the same chinese meal with pork! I hope you like this recipe as much as we do, it took longer to type this out for you than it did to make it!

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Category: Chicken, Chinese, Main Dish, Recipes

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