My ideas for our random What to Cook this Week weekly recipe series include 5 cheap and easy chicken recipes for those of you keen to save money and time in the lead-up to Christmas and New Year. These effortless and affordable chicken dinner ideas include everything from a comforting Cambodian chicken rice porridge to a warming Burmese chicken curry.
This week, conscious that many of you might be busy planning and prepping for Christmas Eve dinner or Christmas Day meals (see our best Christmas recipes for ideas), and that you might also have festive parties to attend and Christmas shopping still to do, I’ve chosen five easy chicken recipes that are affordable, effortless and yet still comforting.
And if you’re really tight on time and on an even tighter budget and are looking for dishes that are even quicker, easier and even cheaper then check out last week’s edition of What to Cook this Week and consider my five fast and frugal noodle recipes from Thai rad na gai to jazzed-up instant ramen.
If you’re set on easy chicken dinners but don’t find anything that takes your fancy below, then search our Grantourismo recipe archive or browse more of our recipe collections, starting with our compilation of best chicken recipes or our round-ups of chicken curries or chicken soups and stews. Note there will occasionally be some over-lap.
Now, if you’ve landed here for the first time or haven’t dropped by in a bit, What to Cook this Week is a random-ish recipe series, where on occasional Mondays I’ll decide to poke around the Grantourismo recipe archives – which are bursting with hundreds of recipes from around the world – for easy midweek dinner suggestions for you.
For What to Cook this Week I share meal ideas for those evenings when you’re feeling like you don’t want to spend a whole night by the stove, as well as suggestions for meals that might require a little more effort for Friday dinner, when you’re happy to while away time in the kitchen with loved-ones, a bottle of wine, and good music in the background.
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What to Cook This Week – 5 Cheap and Easy Chicken Recipes
Cambodian Chicken Rice Soup Recipe for Borbor Sach Moan
We start off our what to cook this week collection with our Cambodian chicken rice soup recipe makes borbor sach moan, Cambodia’s chicken congee, and it’s not only one of my top cheap and easy chicken recipes, it’s also one of my best recipes for rotisserie chicken leftovers.
This nourishing dish is a classic Cambodian-Chinese comfort food favourite and while this recipe uses chicken breasts poached in stock, here in Cambodia anything goes and you’ll also find bowls of borbor with pork, meatballs, fish, dried fish, seafood, snails, and frog legs. So there’s definitely no problem with you using cooked rotisserie chicken pieces.
A range of condiments are also sprinkled, splashed and doused on Cambodian congee, including fish sauce, dried fish floss, chilli oil, chilli flakes, pickles, and fresh aromatic herbs. Borbor doesn’t get as much attention as Cambodian breakfast noodle soups, such as kuy teav and nom banh chok, but it’s just as delicious.
Cambodian Chicken Rice Porridge Recipe for Borbor Sach Moan, Cambodia’s Congee
Thai Rice Soup with Poached Chicken Recipe
As you can see from this selection, we’ve been poaching and shredding a lot of chicken in recent months. This easy Thai rice soup recipe with poached chicken and soft-boiled eggs makes khao tom gai, a beloved single-bowl meal in Thailand that’s eaten any time, and it’s another one of my picks for cheap and easy chicken recipes.
This Thai rice soup with chicken is fantastic, whether you’re in need of comfort, nourishment or a hangover cure (or hangover prevention) or whether you’re looking for a quick and easy meal for dinner this week.
Although it’s a cinch to make, it’s a sublime soup, especially if you have time to leave it on the stove for even longer than I’ve recommended, and especially if you’re a fan of Southeast Asian style rice soups and rice porridges.
Thai Rice Soup Recipe with Poached Chicken and Soft Boiled Eggs for Khao Tom Gai
Burmese Chicken Curry Recipe
This classic Burmese chicken curry recipe makes a fragrant gently-spiced curry that is perfumed with turmeric, ginger, garlic, chilli, and lemongrass. Very straightforward, it’s easily another one of our cheap and easy chicken recipes.
A rich curry with a moreish tomato-based gravy and a layer of aromatic oil that’s quickly soaked up by coconut rice, it can be eaten on its own or served with a salad, such as this Shan tomato salad.
I’ve adapted this curry from my favourite Burmese cookbook, Mi Mi Khaing’s Cook and Entertain the Burmese Way, dating to 1978. It’s a delightful little booklet that is as much a historical document as it is a practical cookbook.
Classic Burmese Chicken Curry Recipe for an Aromatic Tomato Based Curry
Chicken and Potato Soup Recipe
This easy chicken and potato soup recipe makes a homemade potato and chicken soup that is comforting and warming. It’s the kind of soup to make if you’re feeling the cold, and it’s another one of our cheap and easy chicken recipes.
Because while the base of this warming winter soup recipe is an easy chicken stock made from the poached chicken breasts that go into the soup, you could easily use chicken bouillon or chicken stock cubes, and pull apart a rotisserie chicken and add the pieces to the soup near the end.
It’s a simple, hearty broth that’s subtly seasoned but given texture at the end with crunchy croutons and crispy fried shallots and is enlivened by fresh fragrant dill – or any aromatic herb of your choice, as it’s also incredibly versatile.
Chicken and Potato Soup Recipe for a Comforting Soup that Starts with an Easy Stock
Shredded Chicken Salad Recipe with Cucumber, Carrot and Daikon
This shredded chicken salad recipe with cucumber, carrot, daikon, and sesame chilli oil makes a deliciously light yet filling salad that’s perfect for a casual dinner if you’re in the increasingly warm southern hemisphere.
Like so many of our original dishes, this shredded chicken salad recipe was the result of an experiment with leftovers. We had a little Sichuan sesame sauce left over from a bang bang chicken salad we’d had for dinner the previous night, plus loads of grated carrot and daikon from the char siu pork burger recipe with Asian slaw
We had shredded poached chicken breasts in the fridge (but you can also use your leftover rotisserie chicken for this cheap and easy chicken recipe as well), plenty of crunchy cucumbers, and sprigs of fresh coriander I’d picked from our balcony herb garden.
Shredded Chicken Salad Recipe with Cucumber, Carrot, Daikon, and Sesame Chilli Oil
Please do let us know if you’ve make any of these What to Cook this Week recipe ideas for cheap and easy chicken recipes as we love to hear how our recipes turn out for you.
