HOME STYLE SOY SAUCE CHICKEN: 家庭豉油雞

It's very comforting! And tasty, too! Plus soy sauce chicken is so easy to make that one has to wonder why one does not make it more often. With some bokchoi on the side, and rice, it's a delicious meal.

The recipe below is a Cantonese version; people in the north also do something they call soy sauce chicken, but it is oddly unappealing.


豉油雞 
SI YAU KAI

One whole chicken, about four pounds.
Two cups soy sauce.
Half a cup sherry or rice wine.
Six TBS cane sugar.
Six slices of ginger.
Three garlic cloves, whole.
Three scallion, sectioned.
Three star anise pods.
One piece of dried tangerine peel (陳皮 'chan pei').
One dried honey date (金絲蜜棗乾 'gam si mat jou gon').
Half a stick cinnamon or less.
Eight cups water.

Rinse your chicken well, and trim flaps.

Gild the ginger, garlic, and scallion with a little oil in the bottom of a large stockpot, adding the ginger first, then the garlic cloves and scallion sections. Seethe with the sherry, then add everything except the chicken and bring to a boil. Simmer a few minutes, then submerge the chicken, rump upwards. Bring back to a boil, turn low, and poach for a scant twenty minutes. Turn off heat, cover, and let stand for an hour or so.
Remove chicken and drain.

Bring pot back to a boil and reduce liquid over fifty percent.
Strain and cool.

Chop the chicken into large pieces. Arrange on a platter and spoon some of the liquid over.

Reserve the rest of the liquid for other uses.


Some folks swear by rose-flavour wine (玫瑰酒 'mui kwei jau') as the liquor, claiming that it adds an ethereal je ne sais quoi. But unless you have any other reason to use it, such as curing little pork sausages (臘腸 'laap cheung'), it's rather a waste. Sherry is my preferred cooking hooch.
I add tangerine peel and honey date for their perfume instead.

The point of the dish is NOT strongly overflavoured chicken, but a bird which still has natural sweetness and is softly savoury-fragrant.
Gentleness is the trick.
Note that chicken wings and chicken drumsticks can be done similarly; an entire bucket for a party, for instance. I never have sports fans over, and consequently seldom do that.





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