Bourbon Chicken

This dish tastes like Chinese takeout!

This recipe is originally from Food.com.

INGREDIENTS

2 lbs. boneless chicken breasts, cut into bite-sized pieces

1-2 tablespoons olive oil

1 garlic clove, crushed

1/4 teaspoon of grated ginger

3/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes

1/4 cup apple juice

1/3 cup light brown sugar

2 tablespoons ketchup

1 tablespoon cider vinegar

1/2 cup of water

1/3 cup soy sauce

2 tablespoons of cornstarch + water

INSTRUCTIONS

In a small ramekin mix cornstarch with a few tablespoons of water until cornstarch dissolves, set aside.

In a medium sized bowl whisk garlic, ginger, red pepper flakes, apple juice, brown sugar, ketchup, cider vinegar, water, and soy sauce until well combined and brown sugar is dissolved.

Heat oil in a large skillet over medium heat.

Add chicken pieces and cook until lightly browned.

Remove chicken.

Add mixed ingredients in bowl and cornstarch mix and allow sauce to thicken. 

Then add back chicken and bring to a hard boil.

Reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes.

Serve over hot rice and enjoy.

Tea Eggs

Soft boil eggs. Remove from water and crack all over with a spoon. Add to hot water 1/4 cup strong black tea, 1/4 cup soy sauce, 1/2 tsp. Chinese black peppercorns, and a small handful of star anise. Return eggs to brew and simmer for about an hour. The longer they steep, the more flavorful they will be.

Hot and Sour Soup

Becky wants these recipes which come out of my brain only, not my recipe box. These quantities are not for publishing, but for adjusting. Happy cooking.

In one or two quarts chicken broth, cook some pork. Remove and cut into small slices, return to broth. Add 1/2 cup soy sauce and 1/4 c white vinegar, 1 tsp or more black pepper, 1 can drained bamboo shoots (if you like the flavor, you can add the bamboo shoots water to your soup), one box of smooth tofu cut into bite sized pieces. Thicken as desired with cold water and flour or cornstarch. Serve with chopped green onions.

Chinese Steamed Skillet Bread

Make a simple bread dough, maybe 3 cups of flour, a tablespoon of yeast, and 1 or 1-1/4 c warm water. Let it rise, punch down. Roll out to a large (12 inch?) circle. Brush lightly with cooking oil. If you have a few drops of sesame oil to mix in, all the better. Crack black pepper (chinese black pepper is nicer if you can find it), sprinkle sea salt and chopped green onion. Roll up. Coil roll into another circle and flatten with your rolling pin the size of a large iron skillet. Heat skillet with a tablespoon of oil until it spits. Reduce heat and add bread and cover. It will rise in the heat and steam itself. When bread is nicely golden on underside, flip it and grill the other side. All the cooking takes about 15-20 minutes over low heat, maybe less.

Hot & Sour Soup

Okay, journal time. When Cal and I lived in Pea Ridge, Arkansas, we had a favorite restaurant, the Aloha. A Chinese restaurant. It was our date place. And it had excellent hot and sour soup, which we ordered every time. Once when we could not get out, we tried to make hot and sour soup from our little ranch bungalow in White Oak Holler, figuring enough to put vinegar and pepper together. We were surprised at how close we were in our culinary adventure. Not sure where or when I developed the recipe below, and not sure it is exact, which of course is the nice thing about soups. But here it is at Susan's request.

Bring 4--6 c. chicken broth to a boil.
Simmer a pork chop or two until done; remove and slice into strips
Slice into similar strips, or chunk, 1 package of silky tofu
Drain can of bamboo shoots
Hold ingredients aside until after soup has thickened.

Add to broth:
1/2 or 1 cup of soy sauce
1/3 or 1/2 c white vinegar (the SOUR part)(rice vinegar might work)
Lots of pepper to taste (the HOT part)
Then salt to taste if soy sauce wasn't enough
Bring to boil and thicken with a couple tablespoons of corn starch mixed with 1/4 c cold water.

Add pork, tofu, bamboo. Top with chopped green onion.

Susan, after you make this, you can make edits to this post if necessary.

Won Ton Soup

Lili Andreve, who lived with us several times over the years, taught me to do many Chinese dishes. Here is the recipe for WonTon Soup.

WonTon filling:

1# ground beef or ground pork

1 green onion, finely chopped

2 pieces ginger root, minced

1/2 t salt

1 t sesame oil

2 t soy sauce

1 clove garlic, chopped or crushed

Make broth out of 1 chicken leg, water, salt, green onion, 2 pieces ginger root.

Fill each won ton skin with 1/4 t raw filling

Boil won tons in broth

Shred chicken and return to the broth along with soy sauce, vinegar, sesame oil, black pepper, and cilantro. Sorry, no amounts here.

Lili's Anise Chicken

Soak 12 or more dried shiitake mushrooms in warm water. Fry 3 or 4 star anise in 1/4 c oil until flavor is released. Add chopped green onion & chopped ginger. Fry until tender. Add chicken pieces (drumsticks, thighs) and sear, browning evenly. Add 1/2 c soy sauce. Add mushrooms & soaking water. Add 1 or 2 T sesame oil. Simmer chicken in this sauce for at least an hour, or until very tender. Serve with rice.

Faye Hake's Sweet & Sour Pig

Friend Faye lived many years in Taiwan. One of her sons lived with us for a year of college and for his birthday she sent me his favorite recipe. Labor intensive, but lots of fun and worth it once/year! This recipe serves 12 generously.

Cut 2# of pork tenderloin into 1" slices. Pound pork with back of cleaver to tenderize. Cut into 1" squares.

Marinate pork squares at least one half hour in the following mix:

1 t salt

2 T soy sauce

2 T vinegar

2 T cornstarch

2 T cold water

1 lightly beaten egg

1 chunk fresh ginger, minced

Cut up 4 green peppers into uniform bite sized shapes;

cut up a fresh pineapple into bite-sized shapes, set aside.

Mix sauce & let stand until pork is almost finished frying, then begin to heat till thickened:

6 T vinegar

8 T sugar

8 T ketchup

10 T cold water

2 t salt

2 t sesame oil

Heat 6 c oil in wok. Coat pork pieces with cornstarch. Fry about 2 minutes or until done. Drain oil from pan and replace small amount. Fry peppers and pineapple, stirring constantly. Add seasoning sauce when hot and thick and turn off the heat. Add the pork back in & serve over rice.

Eggroll-rolling Technique Diagram a la Becky

Here's a link to the eggroll recipe I put on my blog, including a diagram which my ever-so-skillfully-artistic self drew on Paint.

If my recipe differs at all from the one Mom posted, go with hers.

Eggrolls

Technically called Springrolls, as eggrolls are really thin omelettes stuffed with goodies, I'd best show you how to make these if you dasn't know, as they have a bit o' technique in the rolling. BUT, I post this for Wendy and my daughties who might want recipe details. If you need help with technique, experience is a great teacher.

One package eggroll wrappers from the produce department of a grocery store (Walmart carries them, too), room temperature, preferably.

One head green cabbage, shredded thinly, steamed only until tender enough to squeeze, but not overcooked. Squeeze out extra moisture. You want it to be totally soft, but not yet having lost its bright greenness.

One chicken breast, cooked, pulled apart into small shreds to match your cabbage. Mix with cooked cabbage.

Generously salt and pepper your cabbage-chicken mix. Some add chicken bullion powder. Optionally you could add thinly sliced green onion or shredded carrot.

Lay out your first wrapper as a diamond. Pick up about 1/3 cup cabbage mix and plop in the middle. Pick up the closest corner and wrap upward. Pull sides in in a couple of folds, then using a fingerful of warm water (from a cup you already placed nearby) glue the corner farthest from you down onto the folded wrapper. Hope nothing is exposed that can fall out during the cooking. \

We piled the wrapped cabbage rolls on a serving dish while the oil is heating. If you don't have deep fryer that tells you what temp it is, my Chinese friend taught me to stick a chop stick down into the heated oil. If teeny bubbles come upward from that action, it supposedly is hot enough. If the roll doesn't cook and brown nicely in a matter of about five minutes you have the oil either too cold or too hot. You can use a sturdy sauce pan and fill with about four or five inches of vegetable oil and heat on a burner if you haven't got a deep fryer. I find I have to turn the rolls, sometimes holding them down into the oil in order to cook the other side.

Once your rolls are golden, crispy brown and driving everyone nuts from the delicious smells, you can serve them with a delicious sauce made of soy sauce and freshly crushed garlic, and a tablespoon of sesame oil if you have it.

Grain and vegetable and meat, these make a great meal all in themselves!