What we ate tonight...

I tried a new recipe tonight, and it was really good. Our girls liked it, too. It all began when I found some ground chicken breast on clearance this weekend, simply because it was nearing the sell by date. I felt like it was too hot outside for a chicken chili, and I wasn't in the mood for Rachael Ray's Mexican Lasagna (which is fantastic), so I started searching online for recipes. You can view the original recipe from the Food Network here, but I will share my version below, where I omitted some ingredients and made some other changes.

Steamed-Chicken Rice Fingers with Dipping Sauce

For the rice fingers:

• 2 cups cooked brown rice (buy the ready rice that's pre-cooked)
  
• 1 pound ground chicken
• 1 egg, well beaten
• 1/2 cup grated onion
• 1 can (8 ounces) water chestnuts, finely chopped
• 1/4 cup snipped fresh cilantro leaves
• Spinach leaves to prevent rice fingers from sticking

For the dipping sauce:

• 6 tablespoons soy sauce
• 2 tablespoons fresh lime juice
  
• 2 tablespoons simple syrup (equal amounts of sugar and water heated until sugar melts, then cooled)

Mix together the chicken, egg, onion, water chestnuts, and cilantro in a bowl. Cover a baking sheet with waxed paper. Put rice into a bowl. Shape into 20 "finger" shaped sticks, about the size of a man's finger. Roll each in the rice, then place them on the waxed paper and refrigerate or freeze for at least 1 hour. Once chilled, you can transfer them to an airtight container, separating them with layers of waxed paper, and refrigerate or freeze for future use.

When it's almost time to serve, boil water in the bottom half of a steamer. Line the steaming basket or top half of the steamer with the spinach leaves, place the rice fingers on top of the lettuce, cover, and steam over a rolling boil for about 30 minutes.

To make the dipping sauce, stir together the soy sauce, lime juice, and simple syrup. Serve in small bowls alongside the rice fingers.

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Note: my girls would not eat the dipping sauce, so they had ketchup/mustard. The dipping sauce was good but I could see adding some ginger or something, too. I served with sweet potatoes and green beans.

We ate 10 of them (the girls each had 2, and we each had 3), and the other half I froze, uncooked, for another meal.