Many eons ago, I once attempted to cook hainanese style chicken rice from scratch, i.e. boil the chicken stock, cook the rice with chicken stock and garlic. But it didn't turn out that well, because you do need tons of concentrated chicken stock and fat to give the rice the requisite amount of oomph. Also, you would end up with the dilemma of either overcooked chicken and tasty rice, or tasty chicken and bland rice (unless you are willing to sacrifice one whole chicken just on stock alone, which as a poor student I was not......imagine paying 5 pounds per chicken just to cook it for soup!)
Nowadays I just use the ready chicken rice mixtures in jars, that are so readily available in the supermarket. It tastes good, I add in some pandan leaves to give the rice fragrance, and the chicken is cooked to perfection. It takes only 10 minutes to prepare everything, including the chicken (cooking time is longer, but you only need to watch the chicken now and then).
N.B: I also discovered that the pre-mix chicken-rice mixture makes an excellent soup base / addition for instant noodles.
N.B II: I also have my own recipe for rice-cooker claypot-inspired chicken rice, which I am very proud of, and I think it tastes wonderful. Will post up recipe another time. Desperation (to eat chinese food in angmoh land) drives one to new heights of creativity!
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