Taiwan Style Soy Chicken with Basil

This is my family favorite recipes for Chicken- Taiwanese Style (simplified version)

Ingredients:
Chopped Chicken in pcs
Thai sweet basil
Chinese dark vinegar
Ginger & shallots

Marinates Chicken:
White pepper
2 tsp five spices
2 tbsp of soy sauces
1 tbsp of dark soy sauce
a little sugar
1 tsp sesame oil
2 tsp Chinese wine


Method:
1) Marinate the chicken for at least half an hour to 2 hours in the refregirator.
2) Heat oil in the wok & fried ginger/shallots.
3) Pick up all the chicken from the marinates, retain the marinate juices. Add all the chicken into the wok now.
4) Let the meat brown a little bit for about 3-4 minutes.
5) Add about 4-6 tbsp of water mix with the marinate juices & add into the stir fried chicken.
6) Let the chicken simmers for a few minutes until it is cooked.
7) Add this point of time, you can add in the basil & the vinegar.
8) Stir fry for about a minute & serve.

Option:
-You can also fry some basil leave in oil until it is crisp & sprinkle on top of the dish. It looks more presentable.
- You can also add in one or two dried chili into this dish if you like something spicy.

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Spicy Sambal Prawn & Sambal Petai

Sambal is a very versatile sauces, you can cook seafood & vegetable with it. When you prepare the sambal sauces, you can double or triple the recipes. It keeps well in the fridge for at least 2 weeks. It is very handy when you need it. Please refer to the previous blog "Rice cook in coconut milk (Nasi Lemak) with Sambal" for the sambal recipes.


Spicy Sambal Prawn Recipies
3 tbsp of sambal sauces
2 tbsp some oil for frying
garlic & ginger
handful of prawn
squids (optional)
2 red onion (sliced)
salt & sugar to taste
1 chili (sliced)
3tbsp of water

1. Heat oil in wok, in the garlic & ginger, in the sambal, in the prawn & squid, then stir in the red onion & chili, add in the water, let it simmer until the seafood is cooked. Adjust with salt & sugar to your liking.
   

It is good to eat it with a bowl of white rice. You know what, if you replace the prawns with bitter bean ( it is called Petai) & cook with more red onion. You will have Sambal Petai. Petai is called "smelly bean" in Mandarin due to its strong smell. It has a bitter after taste. You will either like it or hate it. However, this beans is very common in Southeast Asia - Singapore, Malaysia & Indonesia. In fact, the bean is healthy & good for the kidney.

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Rice cooked in coconut milk (Nasi Lemak) with Sambal

In this country, everyone love nasi lemak. You will love the aroma of the nasi lemak & it goes really well with sambal. Nasi Lemak in Malay language means the rice cooked in coconut milk. Sambal is a typical chili based sauces that use as a condiment, it could be very spicy. Both are very popular in Malaysia, Indonesia & Singapore.

A typical Nasi Lemak consists of:

• Rice cooked in coconut milk
• Sambal
• Fried anchovies & peanuts
• Cucumber
• Hard boil egg
• Curry Chicken (optional)

Nasi Lemak Recipes:
200g white rice
220-250ml coconut milk (Santan)
1 lemon grass
pepper & salt
1 knob of ginger

How to cook nasi lemak:

1. Clean the rice. Cooked the rice with coconut milk, lemon grass, pepper, salt & ginger in the rice cooker.

Sambal Recipes:
2 tsp of dried anchovies (cleaned & fried)
4ea of small shallots/red onion
1 knob of ginger
6ea dried chilies (s0aked in hot water)
1ea lemon grass
1cm toasted belacan
half cup of asam jawa juice
0.5 tsp of salt
0.5 tsp sugar
2 tsp of vegetable oil

How to prepare sambal:

1. Blend shallots, ginger, chilies, lemon grass into paste.
2. Heat oil in wok, fried the above paste in oil, add in asam jawa juice, salt & sugar. Let it simmer & reduce to a nice consistency.
   
3. Add the fried dried anchovies into the sambals.
4. Assemble the nasi lemak with sambal & etc....serve.
   

Actually, we had some relatives coming over for our nasi lemak dinner.
We prepare lots of side dishes too.

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Stir-Fried KimChi & Rice

Stir Fried Kimchi & rice is probably the easiest Korean dishes. It is really comforting to have a bowl of Kimchi fried rice when you do not know what to eat. I love cooking & it is fun. But sometimes, I do reach the bottleneck on "Hey,...what am I going to cook today....?". Then, my hubby will give me a standard reply; " I will eat whatever you cook.". I don't kinda like this reply though because he is not helping me to make decision.

Simple recipes:
2tbsp oil
1tsp chili powder (preferably Korean, can put more if you like spicy)
Handful of kimchi (depends on your liking)
1 cup of sticky rice ( I use white rice cuz haven't replenish my inventory)
half a green bell pepper (chopped)
half a red bell pepper(optional)
onion
Prawn (optional)
1 tsp sesame oil

Spring onion, more kimchi, toasted sesame seeds, fried eggs for garnish

Method:
1) Mix the prawn with the chili powder.


2) Heat oil, in the prawn with chili powder,stir fry until the prawn is cooked.
3) Add cooked cooled rice, in the kimchi, all the bell pepper, sesame oil. stir fry for 5 mins.
4) Retain some of the kimchi juice & add into the fried rice- about 2 tbsp of the juice.
5) Garnish with spring onion, kimchi, toasted sesame seeds or shredded eggs.

p/s - since I am not using the sticky rice to make this fried rice, honestly, it looks like a Chinese version of Kimchi. If you really want an authentic Korean fried rice, pls stick to the original recipes.


I did not cooked a very spicy fried rice this time because my 6 years old can't take the spiciness too much.

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