Five Spice Chicken and Wheat Berries

My friend Renee wrote a blog post about the delicious and much appreciated dinner delivery of Five Spice Roast Chicken and Ginger Scented Rice from our friend Katharine. I also was delighted when Katharine arrived at my door with this wonderful meal when my daughter was born.

This week, I finally got around to attempting to make it on my own. The original recipe calls for 8 pieces of chicken, but I had only 2 chicken breasts and scaled the marinade down accordingly. It was the perfect amount of food for my family with a little chicken left over for quesadillas the next day.

I have also been thinking about how our Open Oak Farmers have mentioned that wheat berries (from Open Oak CSA) are a bioregional alternative to rice. I thought I'd give it a try with this recipe. The original calls for grated fresh ginger, but 1t of ground ginger was a reasonable alternative. The wheat berries take longer to cook than the jasmine rice, but it was great!

We also had some bok choy (from Open Oak CSA) so I sautéed some onions and garlic (from Open Oak CSA) in grape seed oil and wilted the greens with some more of the five spice powder.

I'm going to put this recipe in my dinner rotation because it is so tasty, enjoyed by everyone, and easy to make! Yum! Thank you Katharine and Renee!