Rocket Recipe: The Luis-McGee Kedgeree

This recipe was created by Rocket director Charlie Grant Peterkin, in honour of the incredible nurses working tirelessly on the front line. In particular, the recipe was inspired by Portuguese nurse Luis Pitarma and New Zealand nurse Jenny McGee who cared for the Prime Minister during his recent hospitalisation for COVID-19.

The Luis-McGee Kedgeree has the flavours of kedgeree (spice and smoke), but with a small twist: Invercargill is the southernmost city in NZ, and one of the southernmost cities in the world. Many of its Scottish founders names the streets in the city after rivers in Scotland such as the Dee and Tay, the Forth, Ness, and Spey rivers. Smoked haddock is traditionally the fish within a kedgeree, however, haddock isn’t native to NZ waters, and so in this recipe has been replaced with chicken, which is prevalently used within local dishes from Invercargill. The flavour of smoke comes from the crispy Chouriço; the most popular of Portuguese sausages and is similar to Spanish chorizo (made with pork meat and flavoured with paprika). Flavours of spice originate from India – both Britain and Portugal had a presence in the sub-Continent and traded spice which influenced their native cuisine.

Ingredients

Whole roasted chicken, shredded
Chicken stock (either homemade from roasted carcass or bought)
2 eggs
120g chorizo
2 onions
1 garlic clove
Spices and herbs (1 tsp turmeric, 1/2 tsp chilli powder, 1 tsp ground cumin, 1 tsp ground ginger, 1 tsp ground coriander, 1 bay leaf, salt and pepper)
400g brown basmati rice
Handful of fresh coriander

Method

1. Par boil eggs for 5 mins and plunge in cold water, then peel and slice into 6ths. Dice the chorizo and pan-fry until crispy, then drain and discard the oil before setting aside.
2. Finely dice the onions and the garlic, then sauté together until soft and beginning to turn. Add spice mix (turmeric, chilli powder, ground coriander, ground cumin, ground ginger and pepper). Cook for a further few minutes.
3. Wash and soak basmati brown rice. Add rice to onion and spices, coat. Add enough chicken stock to twice cover the rice, throw in a bay leaf, cover with lid and simmer until water absorbed and rice beginning to catch and caramelise. Heat off and leave to stand. Don’t stir at any stage.
4. Lift the lid and add the shredded chicken, then chorizo on top to warm through. After 5 mins, add chopped coriander, ruffle with a fork, and season to taste. Should be light, fluffy with crusty bits of yellow-ish rice.

We hope you’ll make this rather delicious play on the traditional kedgeree at home and think of the incredible workers powering through, for others, in these most astonishing of times. Cheers to them. #rocketrecipes