Authentic Homemade Chinese Food - Chicken with ginger scallion, warmly scented with ginger and steeped in its own chicken broth-

 A homemade chinese food that is easy.

It is a soul-soothing dish.

Chinese New Year is just around the corner. I’m all about easy and effortless recipes, especially now I am about eight months pregnant.

This delicious easy Chinese food recipe is a Cantonese favourite. The Hainanese Chicken recipe requires a little bit of elbow grease, but then afterwards it's all smooth sailing after that. 

Chicken is always served during Chinese New Year because it is the symbol of unity and family. Usually, steam or poached chicken with head and feet is served during our traditional dinner to further emphasize the concept of union and rebirth.

This post is all about a delicious Homemade Chinese Food Classic: Hainanese Chicken

Although Hainanese Chicken is from the Hainan province in China, it originated in Singapore from immigrants from Hainan. It is still well-loved and has an advocated among followers of Cantonese people.

Traditionally Hainanese Chicken is served with three different dipping sauces and broth on the side. And like I said, we are keeping it easy, so we are only going to focus on the most important sauce: the ginger scallion sauce. The most common sauce we Cantonese love to eat with chicken.

Why You’ll Love This!

This easy homemade Chinese food recipe is my ultimate comfort food, and once you try it, you’ll see what the obsession is about.

• Easy - it is a slow-braised chicken in a stock pot, and lightly seasoned. 
• Healthy - Since this Hainanese Chicken is slow-poached in its beautiful water, it's much healthier than fried chicken or pan-fried chicken. Most chicken recipes require oil but this one requires little oil to none. 
• Delicious - ginger and chicken go hand in hand, and it's a soul-soothing taste. Try it and you'll understand why!
• Authentic Cantonese dish- if you're interested in a popular homemade Cantonese dish, this is the one. All Cantonese moms know this recipe!

Hainanese Chicken Rice

This homemade authentic chinese food recipe is so good you’ll be shocked how easy it is to make! Using the same broth that cooked the chicken in is used to make the rice. When it is finish cooking, you’ll open up to a luscious and glossy pot of rice.

Normally in restaurants they use a lot of oil and chicken fat to make it super tasty. In order to get this to be a healthy homemade chine food recipe, we skim the soup of its fat by taking out the skin and defatting the top layer of oil in the soup. But if you’re a person about flavour, then pour on all that glory and work a little harder the next day to burn all those extra calories off.

Cooking methods

Now there are two known ways of making Hainanese Chicken. First, the chicken and rice are steamed together.

 The second way is chicken is poached in its water, and the rice is cooked separately using the chicken broth. We will be using the second method. A little more work, but I like platting it separately with the rice sticking to the chicken.

Pro Tip#1 - Choice of Chicken

The most obvious ingredient for this Hainanese Chicken is the chicken. Try finding fresh, free range chicken because it has a far better taste compared to the regular caged ones. And if you don’t have a choice, go ahead with the usual supermarket chicken.

For my recipe, I exfoliate my chicken. That’s right – they get a spa treatment. I use large sea salt to rub the chicken. Table salt or anything similar in its size is too small for the exfoliation. Perhaps keep your expensive sea salt for other use, but I would recommend kosher salt.

Oh and wear gloves during the exfoliation to protect your hands!

When you’re in the Asian grocery store, there’s many Chinese cooking wine. Two of my favourite I like to use are these two: Qian Hu Chinese Shaohsing Rice Cooking Wine and Premium Shaoxing Rice Chinese Cooking Wine.  

Pro Tip #2 - Cooking temperature

It's important to bring the water to boil before you dip your chicken in. We do this so the skin of the chicken contracts. If it is not boiling the chicken skin won't stick to the flesh and eventually it will fall of the chicken.

When the chicken is inside cooking, it has to be at a low simmer. A hard boil will make the skin tough. We want a juicy bouncy flesh which is why the cooking temperature needs to be a steady low simmer. 

Pro Tip #3 - Ice bath

The ice bath is essential for bouncy chicken meat. When the hot chicken meets instant cold water, the meat immediately contracts so all the juices stay inside the meat and do not evaporate or dry out quickly. This step cannot be missed. 

Pro Tip #4 - Chopping the chicken

Normally in Cantonese whole chicken dishes, we always chop the bones. 

In order to chop the chicken with the bones and not get blades of bones broken in the meat, there are two important factors: knife sharpness and hitting it hard.

The knife needs to be sharp in order to get a clean hit. So sharpen that knife up. Also, I recommend a butcher knife with a good weight on it. 

The most important part: don't hesitate when you raise your knife for that hard hit. When you use a knife and put some force into it, the bones will cut right through and not be smashed into tine brittle pieces. So don't second guess it. Practice makes perfect, and make sure your fingers or anything is nearby when you do this!