Mediterranean Chicken and Rice

Photographs of food really do look better when they're larger, I'll post bigger pictures from now on :).

I haven't posted in awhile. Lately I've been focusing more on preparing fast meals for dinner that don't require me to have the stove/oven on for so so long...our last electric bill was ridiculously high, and we just discovered that our AC might've been the culprit...since it's broken and only works "sometimes". Anyway, I decided I really wanted to make something tasty for dinner tonight, even if it required me to leave the stove on for a little longer than I would've liked. I actually got the idea for it from a book I picked up at the library earlier this week. The dish that inspired me to make this is called Milanese Chicken and Rice Skillet. The thing is, I didn't use a skillet, I used different spices, and even incorporated some Mexican food elements. I actually deviated from the recipe even more by cooking the chicken in a completely different way (I boiled it instead of cooking it in the skillet). The recipe called for chicken breast, but all I had were drumsticks. Improvising was a lot of fun, though. The picture in the cookbook was beautiful and yummy looking, I think that's what drew me to make the dish in the first place. But...I didn't really measure anything, though I do remember all the ingredients I used. Here are the ingredients that were used and the steps I took when making this eclectic plate that has both Mediterranean and Mexican flair.

I used 1 1/2 pounds of chicken drumsticks
I boiled the drumsticks in about 1 pint of water mixed with 1 TBSP chicken bouillon, some garlic salt and a little bit of cilantro (the chicken cooked in about 35 minutes--there were about 5 drumsticks).

While the chicken cooked, I prepared the rice, which is similar to the Mexican rice I've made in the past...but it's been spiced up a little more.
I cooked 1 cup of rice by first lightly frying it in a few TBSPS of olive oil, one small garlic clove, and about 1/8 cup finely diced onion.
I then boiled 3 roma tomatoes, removed their skin, threw them in the blender with 1/4 cup onion, 1 1/2 tsps chicken bouillon, 1 garlic clove, 1 tsp cilantro--this all amounted to about 3/4 of a cup.
To the rice in the pan I added the tomato mixture and 1 1/4-1/2 cups water
As the rice cooked, I added a few sprinkles of garlic salt and pepper, about 1 tsp of paprika and onion powder, cilantro, and parsley. I also added about 1/4 cup chopped red bell pepper, 1/2 cup frozen peas, 1/2 cup chopped carrots, and 1/2 cup celery.
When the chicken finished cooking in the boiling water, I dumped out the water then added some paprika, salt, pepper, about 1 1/2 tbsps Italian seasoning, about 2 TBSP olive oil, 1/4 cup chopped onion, 1/4 cup red bell pepper, 1/4 cup green bell pepper, and 1/2 a small can of diced black olives (about 1.5 oz) along with about 1/2 the olive juice--I seared the chicken in these spices/vegetables, then lowered the flame to a medium setting and sprinkled about 3/4 tbsp brown sugar and 1/4 cup golden raisins into the chicken mix.

That's pretty much it! Oh, and the book where I got the idea for this recipe is called Treasury of Christmas...it's a great book--so many great recipes!