I've modified this recipe so much it barely resembles the original! I'm rating it 4 stars regardless, because it gave me a starting point to what is now one of my family's favorite dinners........... A few things I do is double (or more) the rice, add a can of cream of mushroom, a package of pea pods, 1/2 package of mix veggies, sliced water chestnuts, mushrooms, minced garlic, and celery seed instead of fresh. For the almonds I use Almond Accents (original). They're paper thin and pre-salted. These are a necessity in our opinion. We also serve our noodles on the side so they don't get mushy and everyone can add to their own personal taste. I use rice noodles. The ones that look just like chow mein noodles, but a tad thinner. We prefer these and they only cost a few cents more.
I am giving this 5 stars because, even though I didn't follow it exactly, it inspired me to create a recipe that my family LOVED. My husband has always loved hamburger helper's Rice Oriental so I browned the hamburger with onion powder and garlic salt (my 3 year old recoils at anything with chunks of onion) then added the rice, water, almonds and soy sauce. I am not a huge fan of condensed cream soups so I just made a quick gravy/sauce by combining about two tsp of corn starch and water. The flavor was JUST like hamburger helper and the almonds were a wonderful touch. Much, much healthier and cheaper. I will definitely be making this again!!!
I didn't follow this recipe too closely, but it was a easy to prepare meal. I used cream of mushroom rather than cream of chicken soup. Didn't have celery or almonds. I really think the extra crunch would have been nice, it was a little mushy and didn't have much texture without. If I make again I will probably follow the recipe more closely.
My mom use to make this when I was a child. I was craving it yesterday so looked here and found this recipie. It was perfect. I didn't put in the almonst since my husband hates them and used cream of mushroom instead of cream of chicken because it sounded better. Hit the spot. Easy weeknight meal.
My husband really enjoyed this. I added fresh garlic to the hamburger and didn't have almonds so used water chestnuts. It's a good addition to my everyday recipes but wouldn't hesitate to serve to company either. We added our own soy sauce to taste at the table.
This was a good tasty meal in one dish. It reminded me of those canned chow mein dinners we grew up on only I liked this much better. It just needed some garlic ginger and more veggies like bamboo shoots bean sprouts and water chestnuts to make this top notch. I doubled the rice and cut the onion in half. I added a little garlic to the meat as it cooked. I didn't really measure out the chow mein noodles just covered the top with them. We will definitely fix this again.
I upped the rice to 2c and like so many others, used cream of mushroom soup instead. Other than that, followed the recipe to the letter. Pretty good stuff, not gourmet by it is a homey, filling dinner. Thanks
This was very good. I took it to work for lunch and actually had people stop and tell me how good it smelled! I took some of the advice from other reviews and added a can of water chestnuts to this. I also toasted the almonds to bring out more of the flavor. Thanks! Good recipe!
We loved it! I added just a little more celery and no almonds because of my husband. We left the table without any leftovers....so I will be doubling it next time. My teenagers loved it too!! Thanks for the recipe!
