Claypot rice (Sa Bo Fan)

I was doing some groceries shopping the other day in the supermarket when i walk past a row of food mixes and found myself attracted to a row of asian food mixes. As there is a promotion for every 3 packets purchased, I grabbed 3 packets which i am interested to try out. One of them is the Cantonese Claypot Rice which is also known as Sa Bo Fan.

I am a fan of instant food mixes/cake mix/bottled sauces as all of these really help to save a lot of time which would be required to prepare the spices and ingredients from scratch. In addition, I don't have to buy some many ingredients just to cook a dish which I might not want to cook again in the next few weeks and usually by the time I am ready to cook the same dish, the ingredients have usually expired. Of course, being an amateur, instant food mixes are quite idiot proof too so I get to dish out beautiful looking food in a jiffy!! Hahaha......so you see, everyone can be a good cook now that there is so many wonderful products out there in the supermarket which can help to make you into an terrific cook in a matter of minutes!

The claypot rice is really easy to cook using the food mix. In fact, I think the preparation of the ingredients take longer than the cooking time. Anyway, for those who are interested in a fast yet tasty meal, I would recommend this. Here it is:

Claypot Rice
Serves 4

Ingredients:

600g cooked rice (I used 1 and a half cups of uncooked rice in the rice cooker)
2 chinese sausages, thinly sliced diagonally
Green leafy vegetables (your choice of vegetables - add more if you like more veg in your rice)
250g chicken, cut into cubes
4 -5 dried mushrooms, soaked in hot water and cut into shreds (the water can be reserved for use in cooking the rice to enhance the flavour of the claypot rice)
1 packet of claypot rice mix (I used Asian Home Gourmet brand)
1 tablespoon of dark soy sauce
Chopped coriander or sliced spring onions as garnish

Heat oil in a non-stick wok on medium heat. Add chicken, mushroom and sausage. Stir fry for 3-4 minutes.
Add rice, claypot rice mix and dark soy sauce. Stir fry till all the ingredients and sauces are well mixed.
Transfer it to a claypot. Cover and cook gently for 5 minutes on low heat. Garnish and serve hot.

For those who do not have a claypot at home, you can transfer it to a rice cooker and keep warm till it's ready to be served. (I kept it in a rice cooker as my family did not eat it immediately after I cooked it which helped to keep the rice moist and warm till it's serving time).

Overall, my family like the claypot rice although my mum thinks that it could be better. Hmmm.......I remember I have a recipe for a claypot rice (cooked using microwave and using ingredients from scratch) somewhere which I cooked many years back. Let me go look for it and try that recipe again. Then I would be able to compare which one is the better one.......till then, the claypot rice mix would have to do........:)