I haven’t had a burger for weeks. But I got this idea during the time when I was massively obsessed with burgers. My obsession has not waned, it’s just that I have not been well and my stomach somewhat rejects “heavy” food.
All I eat nowadays is porridge, soups, noodles and yes, porridge.
Suddenly there was a need for me to go shopping for rice. I started with the Jasmine brand since it is so well-known and established.
I found this Super 5 special to be really good. Initially I chose it cos it says “super import”. Not sure what that means but I’m guessing that if it’s good for import, then it’s probably a grade better than the rest? 
At the rate I’m eating porridge I was surprised this little bag goes such a long way. And it’s only RM3.90 per kg!
But of course I had re-stock after a while and while browsing at Jusco this week, I saw this promotion for the Jasmine Basmathi rice. Wow, the Jasmine Basmathi King is normally about RM50 and I think this is a special for the upcoming Raya period. This promotion ends at the end of July so whoever who loves Basmathi rice from Jasmine should go stock up quick!
Anyhow my big brother who is extremely fussy about what he eats told me before that he loves the Jasmine Basmathi King as well. And no, it is not necessary to cook only briyani with basmathi (I have that notion too – basmathi = briyani). My big bro cooks it as his “every day” rice and he loved the fluffy grains and its distinctive taste.
And so when I have a pack of Jasmine Basmathi from the kind folks from Jasmine I wondered what else could I cook with it. Obviously majority of it goes to my porridge diet. But basmathi for porridge is kind of a waste isn’t it?
So hey, let’s see if this rice works as a RICE BURGER, I thought. Besides I have always been fascinated with the funky combos that some of our burger joints here had came up with, I have been wondering if I could match their creativity.
Well, obviously not. I have never been the creative kind so I stole this idea from the Melaka rice balls. If it can be round, why can’t it be flat? And instead of a patty, why not just plain original chicken?
Plus I didn’t have to worry if the flavours will gell as it is basically made up of the very same ingredients you find in a typical plate of chicken rice, but in a different form. 
And thus that idea grew in my mind. I asked my neighbour to help since she’s the maestro of chinese cooking. She was up for chinese chicken rice but couldn’t fathom the whole burger idea. LOL!
And so on one fine day last week the cooking lesson starts.
Wash the rice as you would usually but substitute the water with the stock from boiling the chicken, my aunty instructed.
She sent me to her garden to cut some fresh pandan leaves, fried some garlic oil which she added along with slices of ginger.
“That’s it” she said, now all you have to do press a button on the rice cooker.
It was barely 30 minutes before the whole house was filled with the wonderful smell of chicken rice. We opened the pot and saw that the basmathi soaked up quite a lot of water so we added more stock and salt before cooking it a bit more.
Hmmm.. beautiful fluffy grains. The Basmathi is certainly suitable for “oil” rice. That’s not surprising since one of the characteristic of basmathi grains are its fragrance and its ability to maintain its whole shape when cooked. I know some cooks had used it before for nasi lemak (rice cooked in coconut milk).
My next task was the chicken. This was easy as all I had to do was to chop it up.
Let’s not forget the sauce! My aunty made her own “special black sauce” and her secret “chicken rice chilli”.
We added some vegetable into the remaining stock for the soup, cut some organic cucumbers and voila, dinner is ready! 
Everyone had praises for the rice. Aromatic, firm, slightly nutty and it absorbed the chicken stock really well. My aunty and I are the healthy type so we omitted butter/margarine for the rice so it wasn’t too oily. In fact, we used organic chicken and cucumbers. On ordinary days my aunt cooks with organic rice! That’s how health conscious she is. However I would advice to add butter or chicken oil for extra flavour.
Now that everyone is happy with their chicken rice, I got to work.
From what I know of basmathi the grains doesn’t break so it doesn’t releases starch so it won’t be sticky enough to hold any shape. But I didn’t have to worry about flavour as I know the grains absorbs liquid well.
To make my job easier I work with the rice when it is warm. By pressing and compacting in a round shape container, I managed to mould the rice into rice “cakes.
The oil in the rice helped and to further “retain” its shape I could have pan fried it. In fact, I think pan-frying it with some chicken oil would be a good idea. However for this round I didn’t as everyone at the table was so fascinated and everyone had something to say; one of which is “it looks fine as it is”.
And it was firm enough in my hand so I took their advice. Next I layered thinly sliced cucumbers on one side of the patty. Then I topped it with chunks of chicken before a drizzle of soy, aunty’s special sauce and lastly her kick-ass chilli.
I prefer mine without skin but the rest at table (being typical Chinese) wanted the skin so I made some with skin.
I realized the skin added a nice yellow hue to the ensemble and so I started taking pictures of the ones with skin instead!
It does look pretty after some black and red.
Finally I lay the other rice cake on top and crowned my “masterpiece” with coriander sprigs.
Hmmmm… what do you think?
This is the Basmathi King I used. It’s selling at Jusco now for RM37.99 only so grab some quick as this promotion is only while stock last or till 31st July 2013.
Would YOU like to try my chicken rice burger? Maybe I’ll have a burger party too!