Homecooked Hainenese Chicken Rice (2005-09-22)
My favorite Singapore dish is Hainenese Chicken Rice, particularly that one from Chatterbox of Mandarin Hotel in Singapore.
To cook the chicken, you put it in a pot of simmering broth for just
a few minutes and then leave it to fully cook through with the heat
turned off and the lid on. This way, the meat remains very moist
and tender. When the broth is almost cool, by which time the
chicken will have been completely cooked, you use it to steam rice with
stir-fried chopped garlic and shallots. The broth can also be
used to make soup to be eaten with the meal.
To serve the dish, the chicken is cut into bite-sized pieces with
cucumber slices and tomatoes. Three sauces ( ginger and onion,
chili, and thick sweet dark soy) traditionally accompany the chicken at
Chatterbox.
I cooked the dish at home the other day the best that I could.
The chicken was not the flavorful yellow skin type and I didn't make
three sauces either. All we needed was the sinfully delicious and
oddly addictive ginger and green onion dipping sauce.
The result was still pretty impressive. We had a blast polishing the
entire chicken and the sauce. The rice was so yummy I could've
eaten that alone without any other dishes. I posted a few more
pictures today to show you some of the cooking steps. Perhaps
you'd like to try making this dish at home?
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