Pomegranate Sesame Chicken

I recently found myself with some tricky leftover ingredients to use up - half a pomegranate and half a bottle of pomegranate juice.  Yup - not necessarily everyday items in my kitchen.  To make sure I did not waste these reasonably pricey ingredients, I went searching for things I could make with them - and I landed on this Pomegranate Chicken recipe.  

How delicious does the original look? It looks much better than mine because it appears ever so much stickier, with the chicken liberally coated with an ooey, gooey pomegranate and soy sauce.  My dish did not end up with anywhere near as much sauce; that said, I still enjoyed this recipe, which is a little off the beaten track, and which achieved my aim of using up a good percentage of my leftover pomegranate ingredients.

The sauce is a savoury-sweet combination; the pomegranate seeds add tartness and crunch; the sesame seeds add flavour and texture; and the broccoli adds the much-needed vegetables. I didn't have mushrooms, so I left them out, and I added some yellow capsicum.  I also didn't bother with the ginger rice pilaf and just used boiled brown rice instead.  However, this was still a tasty dish, and I would try it again if I ever ended up with the same unusual combination of ingredients.