Right now I am working on making a lot of meals that are cheap and are made with the ingredients I already have in my pantry. I like to make Chinese food, so we always have sesame seed oil in our house. It gives it so much flavor. 

Yesterday I put together a blog post with a ton of my favorite recipes for things that I make from scratch. When we lived in Mexico, I had to make a lot of things from scratch because I couldn’t get them in Mexico or it was very expensive. 

This makes a ton of food and probably costs about $7 for all the ingredients – or less. 

My kids loved it and had more than one serving. Plus we had leftovers to eat for lunch the next day. 

I used my InstantPot to cook the chicken so I could shred it. It was 1 pound of chicken + 3/4 cup of chicken broth for 12 minutes. (I always use the manual setting.) 

But you can use any meat or no meat in this dish! It’s super customizable! 

More Easy Recipes:

• Picadillo – Mexican Beef Dinner Recipe
• 45+ Random Dinner Ideas
• 20 Cheap and Easy Instant Pot Dinner Recipes
• 40 + Easy Dinners Made With Shredded Chicken
• Chicken Alfredo Bake
• Chicken Pot Pie
• Chicken With Carrots and Potatoes In An Oven Bag
• Garlic Butter Sauce – use it on spaghetti, seafood and more!

Scroll to the bottom for the printable recipe. 

 

Chicken Fried Rice

• 3 Cups uncooked rice + water to prepare the rice
• 1 pound of chicken – shredded
• 3 – 4 eggs (depending on how many people you want to feed)
• 2 Tablespoons oil
• 1/2 cup soy sauce
• 3 tablespoons sesame oil
• 1 can of carrots (or peas and carrots)
• green onions to garnish

Instructions:  

Cook the rice according to the package directions. I like to use 3 cups of rice and 3.5 cups of water to prepare my rice. 

While the rice is cooking, scramble the eggs and chop them up in small pieces. Remove from the pan and set aside. 

Add the oil to the pan and add the ingredients – mixing well after you add each item. I added the rice, eggs, carrots, chicken, soy sauce and sesame oil. Then I topped it with the green onions – but those are really optional.

Heat it up and stir for about 5 minutes to let all the flavors mix together. 

Serve and enjoy! This meal comes together in about 30 minutes or less and it’s a crowd-pleasing meal. It’s cheaper and better than takeout Chinese chicken fried rice!