Saturday, March 25, 2006

Recipe # 4 - Hainanese Chicken Rice

Have been advising and giving people recipe for Hainanese Chicken Rice and I realized that I havent been cooking this for quite some time. So, I went ahead and cook them. Somehow, I have to break them into 3 parts as I need to up date my blog more often or I will start losing readers and friends....chuckle

Started off with the chilli sauce and here's what you need.

Fresh Red Chilli - 100 gm
Garlic - 40 gm
Ginger - 60 gm
Chilli Padi - 30 gm ( to taste )
Calamansi Juice - 20 ml
Sugar , Salt and White Pepper to taste
Chinese Parsley - 20 gm
Chicken Stock - 60 - 80 ml
Chicken Fat ( oil ) - 20ml


Blend the first 4 ingredients. Add in chopped parsley. Mixed in the rest of the ingredients. Season to taste.

Some people would want to cook this sauce. Go ahead then, No problem with it. The only difference is after blending all the ingredient, sauteed with chicken fats and then dump in the stock. Simmer and season. The question is, must you do that ? In the end you wont be eating this sauce warm or hot. It will still be either room temperature or chilled, right ?

Picture is so much clearer now that I followed Pusiva's Culinary Studio style of using white back ground with no flash and better lighting.
































The ingredient - note the salt between the chilli padi


















End product - looks good eh ?


Simple Ginger Sauce
100 gm Ginger - grated
10 ml Chicken Oil
Chicken Stock
Seasoning
Mixed the grated ginger with a little oil. Season and dilute with stock.





































Chicken Rice

Rice - 150 gm
Chicken Oil - 20 - 50 ml
Shallot - Chopped
Garlic - Chopped + additional 2 - 3 cloves whole peeled
Old Ginger - Grated + 1 cube peeled young ginger ( 1 inch )
Screwpine leave ( Pandan ) - 1 piece ( tie it up )
Margarine - 1 tablespoon ( for colouring and extra flavour )
Chicken Stock
Seasoning

In a stock pot or rice cooker, sauteed chopped shallot, chopped garlic and grated old ginger with chicken oil till fragrant. Add in the washed rice and mixed. Pour in chicken stock till enough to cook the rice. Dump in the rest of the ingredient and season. If using rice cooker, just press the cook button. If using stock pot, cook on medium low heat uncovered. Stir occasionally.

Once cooked, remove the pandan leave, cube ginger and garlic clove. Served hot.

















From Bottom left - chicken oil, shallot, garlic & ginger paste, Margarine, ginger, uncook rice, pandan leave, sauteed garlic.


















End product - light fluffy chicken flavour rice with a hint of ginger in every bite.

I prefer poach chicken over anything else for my Hainanese Chicken Rice. Cleaned whole chicken and trimmed fats. You can use that to render your chicken fat. Place whole chicken into a pot of water and bring to a boil for 30 minutes. Make sure it is cooked. I time mine as 39 minutes. So, i guess that will make the cooking time as 40 minutes. Place the chicken in another pot and place under running water for 15 minutes. This will get you smooth and tender chicken pieces as in Pak Charm Kai....if you like them warm, i suggest you watch the chicken after 25 minutes of cooking. Dont over cook them or you will end up with real tough chewy pieces of chicken.


















To serve, chopped the chicken up to bite size. Topped with mixture of soy sauce and sesame oil. Garnish with cucumber, spring onion and chinese parsley. Even tomato is a cool accompaniment.

Served with the chilli sauce and ginger sauce.


Cheers !