Roasted Chicken Lunch Containers

The last hours of my Sunday cooking fest was the rice pilaf and the roasted chicken.


For the rice, I decided to try Epicurious's recipe for Saffron Rice Pilaf with Apricots and Almonds. By now, the chicken stock was finally finished. One of the nice things about having tons of what I've deemed to be "necessary" spices and ingredients is that we already had on hand: saffron, almonds, dried apricots, ground cloves, rice, and butter. I was out of currants (used raisins instead), as I had used the last on Middle Eastern Sesame Lamb Meatballs, which I make as h'ors d'oeuvres for holiday parties.

Speaking of which, what should I make this year? I always want to do bacalao croquettes and fried risotto balls stuffed with cheese, but it's hard to get the timing right on those, so that they are still hot for guests.

Actually, maybe my list of what we have on hand really isn't that impressive at all. Living in Manhattan, I think of myself as uber prepared simply because our refrigerator stocks more than mayonnaise, ketchup and mustard; our cupboards more than cooking oil, salt and pepper; and our drawers more than a myriad of low and regular sodium soy sauce packets, and various sized individual salt and pepper packets, and plastic knives and forks neatly packaged with a paper napkin.


My roasted chicken is just based on the Pioneer Woman's recipe for them: Spicy Roasted Chicken Legs. I made variations on them all the time. This time I roasted thigh-legs and used a combination of Hungarian paprika, seasoned salt and mixed chili powder.


My lunch boxes for the week: roasted paprika chicken over saffron rice pilaf with roasted carrots, zucchini, cauliflower, eggplant, mushrooms, and topped with a slice of cranberry-raisin bread.