It’s TURKEY week!  We’re hosting our first big family Thanksgiving and in preparation we’re trying to clean out the fridge to make room for all the apps, side dishes and of course the gigantic turkey that needs to stay in there until Thursday morning.

I apologize in advance for the lack of pictures – this was kind of an empty the fridge whim and I really wasn’t sure how it was going to turn out (I wasn’t too hopeful). We had leftover Italian chicken sausage from a second night of making Stuffed Acorn Squash (which I took pictures of the second time around – will update post) and shredded chicken which we make a batch of every week for salads and sandwiches.

Thinking of sausage and chicken together immediately had me thinking of jambalaya. I looked up a couple of recipes and they all had the entire process taking an hour plus. Not gonna happen on a Monday hunny. So we made it up as we went along and were pleasantly surprised – I thought it tasted just like jambalaya I’d had out that had been slow cooked.

Prep Time: 10 minutes (unless you’re a super chopper – I’m pretty slow)

Cook Time: 15 minutes

Ingredients:

• 1 shredded chicken breast
• 2 links pre-cooked italian style chicken sausage (you could use pork sausage as well just make sure you cook it)
• 1/4 cup diced onion
• 1/4 cup diced green pepper
• 1/4 cup diced celery
• 2 cloves diced garlic (if you’re using jarred minced garlic this is 2 teaspoons)
• 1/4 cup medium heat salsa
• 1 1/2 tablespoons McCormick Baja Cajun seasoning
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1/2 package of 10 minute brown rice (we made a whole package of Uncle Ben’s and just used half)

Place the rice packet in a saucepan of water and bring to a boil – boil for 10 minutes according to the package directions.

Meanwhile chop your onions, celery and green pepper. Saute vegetables in tablespoon of olive oil over medium heat until cooked through – about 6-8 minutes. Add garlic cook an additional 2 minutes or so making sure the garlic does not burn. If the mixture looks to dry and all the oil is absorbed add a little bit of water to avoid burning (don’t worry it will cook off).

Add sausage and continue to cook until heated through. Add rice, chicken and cajun seasoning toss to combine cook for an additional 2-3 minutes to ensure the entire dish is hot and enjoy!

I think this would be really good with shrimp as well. You could either use it in place of the chicken or as a little something extra!