Thai Chicken and Rice with Crack Sauce

Why it’s here

This is the meal-prep bowl that doesn’t get old by Thursday. The sauce hits sweet, salty, sour, and hot all at once. That’s why people call it crack sauce. It turns plain ground chicken and rice into something you actually look forward to. Real carbs for training days, nearly 50 g of protein a bowl, and one pan to wash.

Makes 4 bowls.

Ingredients

Crack sauce

• 1/4 cup low-sodium soy sauce
• 1 tbsp fish sauce
• 3 tbsp honey
• 2 tbsp sriracha (more if you like it hot)
• 1 tbsp unseasoned rice vinegar
• Juice of 1 lime
• 1 tsp toasted sesame oil
• 2 cloves garlic, grated
• 1/2 tsp red pepper flakes

Chicken and rice

• 2 lb ground chicken
• 1 tbsp avocado or other neutral oil
• 1 small onion, diced
• 1 red bell pepper, diced
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 cup Thai basil leaves, loosely packed (regular basil works)
• 4 green onions, sliced
• 4 cups cooked jasmine rice (from about 1 1/3 cups dry)

Method

1. Start the rice first so it’s ready when the chicken is.
2. Whisk every sauce ingredient together in a bowl or jar. Taste it. It should be loud. Adjust heat with sriracha and sour with lime.
3. Heat the oil in your biggest skillet over medium-high. Add the onion and bell pepper and cook 3–4 minutes, until the edges start to color.
4. Add the chicken. Break it up and let it sit a minute between stirs so it browns instead of steams. 6–8 minutes, until there’s no pink.
5. Add the minced garlic and cook 30 seconds.
6. Pour in the sauce and let it bubble 2–3 minutes, stirring, until it reduces and coats the meat.
7. Kill the heat, fold in the basil and most of the green onion.
8. Divide rice and chicken across 4 containers. Top with the rest of the green onion.

Macros per serving

Worked out from the ingredient weights above using standard USDA values, with regular ground chicken. Swap in 99% lean ground chicken breast and a bowl comes out around 590 calories, 60 g protein, and 9 g fat.

Notes

• Storage: 4 days in the fridge. Keep the lime wedges separate if you add them.
• Reheat: add a splash of water over the rice before microwaving so it doesn’t dry out.
• Cut version: half the rice and a heap of shredded cabbage or cucumber. Halving the rice saves about 100 calories and 22 g carbs a bowl.
• Double the sauce. It keeps a week in the fridge and it’s just as good on eggs, salmon, or a plain rice bowl.
• Fish sauce smells rough in the bottle and tastes right in the pan. Don’t skip it.