Pray, Eat and Bum in front of the TV.

My family normally don’t celebrate Eid al-Adha or commonly known here as “Hari Raya Haji”. When we do celebrate, we do it low key. We just cook simple traditional Raya food like curry chicken and 'rendang' and eat in front of the TV. No visiting friends and relative.

Pray, eat and bum in front of the TV. That's how we roll.

This year, since all my mom’s children are scattering all over the world and I'm the only one in Miri, we decided not to do anything. At all. So I stayed home and cooked something different for my husband instead of the usual menu.

I made roasted whole chicken stuffed with dirty rice.

Many asked why is it called dirty rice. I honestly do not know. I found the recipe online and decided to try it and it was delicious! The dish was originally from New Orleans. I stuffed the rice in a roasted chicken just to try something new and man, the taste was mind blowing!

Dirty Rice

Ingredients
1. 1 lb. chicken livers, washed, rinsed & trimmed
2. 2 cloves garlic, minced
3. 1 c. chopped onion
4. 1/2 c. chopped celery
5. 4 c. uncooked rice
6. 1/4 c. chopped fresh parsley leaves
7. Salt & pepper to taste

Instructions
1. Cook the minute rice according to package directions. Add in chicken stock for taste.
2. Pulse liver until almost liquefied.
3. In a large pan, sauté the garlic until fragrant. Cook the meats until browned.
4. Add the vegetables and salt & pepper, and cook until tender. If the mixture is too wet, let it reduce.
5. Gently fold in the rice. Season with salt and pepper. Garnish with parsley.

The roasted chicken’s recipe was from the great man himself, Jamie Oliver and here’s the recipe (I made few changes of my own):

Ingredients:
• 1 whole chicken
• 2 medium onions
• 2 carrots
• 2 sticks of celery
• 1 bulb of garlic
• olive oil
• salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 1 lemon

Instruction:

• Preheat your oven to 240°C/475°F/gas 9
• There’s no need to peel the vegetables – just give them a wash and roughly chop them
• Break the garlic bulb into cloves, leaving them unpeeled
• Pile all the veg and garlic into the middle of a large roasting tray and drizzle with olive oil
• Drizzle the chicken with olive oil and season well with salt and pepper, rubbing it all over the bird
• Carefully prick the lemon all over, using the tip of a sharp knife
• Put the lemon inside the chicken’s cavity (I squeezed the lemon all over the chicken and put the lemon among the veg)
• Place the chicken on top of the vegetables in the roasting tray and put it into the preheated oven
• Cook the chicken for 1 hour and 20 minutes
• Baste the chicken halfway through cooking and if the veg look dry, add a splash of water to the tray to stop them burning
• When cooked, take the tray out of the oven and transfer the chicken to a board to rest for 15 minutes or so.

There you go. Try it if you like and tell me about it, ey?

Ciao!