Food Matters Project: Chicken Jook with Lots of Veggies

The Food Matters Project challenge for this week was Mark Bittman's Chicken Jook with Lots of Vegetables, chosen by Erin of The Goodness Life. Click here to see what everyone else created; look in the comments section!

This was an easy lunch on a Saturday afternoon; I set it on the stove in the morning and went about my day, doing laundry and cleaning, and by the time we were all hungry, it was done. Perfect!

One note before we begin: I hardly think that cabbage, snow peas, and bean sprouts count as "lots" of vegetables. I bolstered the pot with the bounty from my CSA box, using leeks, carrots, celery, fennel, kale and chard. That's lots of veggies! Also, I didn't follow Bittman's procedure very closely at all...

1 fennel bulb, trimmed and diced
2 leeks, cleaned and cut into coins
2 chicken breasts, boneless and skinless
olive oil
4 carrots, sliced
6 stalks of celery, sliced
2 C short grain brown rice
8 C organic chicken broth
2 T minced ginger
2 T minced garlic
2 C baby kale, destemmed
2 C green chard, thinly sliced
4 T soy sauce
2 T sesame oil

Steam the brown rice in a small pot until cooked. In a large soup pot, saute the fennel and leeks in a splash of olive oil until they are softened and beginning to caramelized. Lay the chicken breasts on top of that and cook until opaque. Add in the carrot, celery, ginger, garlic, kale, chard, and brown rice. Pour in the chicken broth and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to a simmer and cook for an hour and a half to two hours. The jook should have a soupy and creamy consistency but still have a little chew. The chicken will be very tender, so you can break it into small pieces as you're serving. Season with soy sauce and sesame oil. Serve hot.