Mango Chaulafan

When I studied abroad in Ecuador, I spent about a month of the semester living in the capitol, Quito, with a great host family. There were chaulafan places all over the city, literally on every block in some neighborhoods. Chaulafan is Ecuadorian-style fried rice - it's crazy easy and is a perfect comfort food.

A lot of the great flavor comes from cooking the rice in chicken broth. I made some homemade broth.

I made a big dutch oven full of the normal, typical chaulafan (at least as normal as it can be made by me in my Pgh kitchen!) for my birthday dinner (more than a month ago... I am very bad at blogging!), and it was all eaten up. But the next day I wanted more, so I made another batch for Britt and me. For the second batch, I substituted mango for shredded chicken since I had used all the chicken the day before. Britt liked the mango version even better, but I love it both ways. 

I made aji criollo, Ecuadorian cilantro-y hot sauce, to serve with everything, including chaulafan.

MANGO CHAULAFAN
Adapted from Laylita's Recipes

Want to make your own chicken broth to cook the rice in?

5 lbs whole chicken, or assorted pieces
10 cups water
1 white onion, diced
2 carrots
2 celery stalks, finely chopped
5 cilantro sprigs
Salt to taste

Boil it all up for about an hour or until the chicken is cooked through. Make sure you don't overcook the smaller pieces - you might want to take them out a little earlier and let the bigger pieces boil for a bit longer.

Remove the chicken and shred once cooled. Strain the broth and save for cooking the rice. There should be plenty left over. I had a couple bowls of plain broth, soooo good.


1 tbs oil/butter
2 tbs white onion, diced
3 ¼ cups chicken broth
3 cups uncooked rice
Salt to taste

Heat the butter/oil in a large pan or dutch oven, add the onions and the uncooked rice and stir it up. Then at the broth, bring it to a boil and simmer for 20 minutes.

(This looks like a pretty long ingredient list, which I normally avoid, but I usually have most of this stuff in the kitchen already.)

2-3 tbs oil or butter + 3 tbs butter
1 cup diced white onions
6 garlic cloves, crushed
4 oz pancetta or diced bacon
3 tbs finely chopped cilantro
2 tbs hot pepper powder
1 tsp ground cumin
½ tsp achiote powder
2 bell peppers (1 red and 1 green), diced
1 cup cooked peas
2 cooked carrots, diced (1 cup)
½ cup raisins
6 eggs, scrambled
7 tbs soy sauce
2 tbs Worcester sauce
1 mango, diced
3 tbs finely chopped cilantro/parsley
2 bunches scallions or green onions, finely chopped

Heat the first 2-3 tbs butter or oil over medium heat in a large pan to prepare a refrito or base for the chaulafan. 

Add the chopped onions, diced pancetta, crushed garlic, 1 tbs Worcester sauce, 1 tbs soy sauce, cumin, cilantro, hot pepper powder, and achiote powder; cook for about 5-8 minutes or until the onions are soft. 

Add the cooked rice, chicken meat, and diced bell peppers. Stir well and cook over medium high heat for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Stir in the remaining soy sauce, remaining Worcester sauce, scrambled eggs, peas, carrots, raisins, mix well.

Add the mango, chopped herbs and green onions.

Serve with avocado slices, aji or hot sauce, pickled red onions or curtido, and ketchup (or spicy ketchup - Heinz has that limited edition jalapeno ketchup out).