Tuesday, April 04, 2017

What's on the Menu this week? Black pepper Chicken with vegetables


Lynne uses strips of bite sized thigh meat in this stir fry, but a mix of breast and leg meat will also be fine. You can use any vegetables that are suitable for a quick stir fry like those below or add broccoli, sweet corn, mange tout, mushrooms, etc. You need about four cups. You can use coconut oil for frying if you don't have peanut. Peanut oil can take a very high heat which makes it suitable for stir frying. Never use olive oil, it laminates and turns to plastic which is very bad for you
350 g chicken cut into 5 cm strips - 1 T corn flour - 1 tsp light soy - 1 tsp Shaoxing rice wine or dry sherry - 1 garlic clove, grated - 1.5 cm knob of fresh ginger, grated - 2 T peanut oil for frying - selection of fresh vegetables, see below - 1/2 an onion, roughly chopped - !/2 cup of fresh bean sprouts - 4 spring onions, sliced
Stir fry sauce: 1 tsp freshly ground black pepper, according to your taste - 2 Tbspns oyster sauce- 2 tsp light soy sauce - 2 tsp Shaoxing rice wine or dry sherry - 1/2 t sesame oil - 1 tsp honey - salt
Preparation
Stir the corn flour, the light soy and rice wine into the chicken, mix well and set aside for at least half an hour. This flavours and tenderised the chicken. This is known as velveting the chicken to tenderise it.
Vegetables: Cut these into bite size pieces: half a red pepper - half a green pepper - 2 small carrots - 1 courgette - 1 stick of celery - 10 green beans - 1/4 of a Chinese cabbage, roughly chopped
Heat your wok and when hot put in the oil. Just before it begins to smoke, quickly add the rough cut onion and stir fry for a minute. Add the garlic and ginger, stir then immediately add the chicken and brown quickly on all sides. Add all the chopped vegetables and mix quickly to stir fry for a minute or two. Add the sauce and stir well. Cook till it starts to bubble. Fry for about three or four minutes till the chicken is cooked and the cabbage is beginning to wilt. Add the bean sprouts at the end and quickly stir them in. Top with the spring onions and serve from the wok with noodles or rice. Taste and add salt if needed
© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2017

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