International Shanghai Chicken Project

John, from Sybaritica, wrote a few days ago about a project proposed by his fellow blogger Stefan. Project “International Shanghai Chicken”, it is international because Clayton (Stefan’s friend who proposed the idea in the first place) lives in the US, Stefan in the NL and John in Canada. The fun part is that the project is open to everyone.

The rules (there are always rules) are simple:

• Prepare a dish inspired by Bamboo Restaurant’s Shanghai Chicken.
• It has to include chicken, chilies of some sort, vegetable greens, and nuts.
• It could be a known recipe or one of your own — traditional or newly invented.
• Blog about your dish or send Stefan photos and a description of what you did and he will post about it in his blog. Leave a comment on his blog if you’d like to send stuff by e-mail, so he can provide you with his e-mail address.

I couldn’t resist the temptation and I decided to jump in. Here is my version.

Go take a look at Stefan’s, Clayton’s and John’s blogs they are very, very good. And there are more people participating, all the pingbacks are on Stefan’s post.

Ingredients

• 2 skinless chicken breasts, tiny diced
• 1 tbsp. cornstarch
• 2 tsp. sesame oil
• 4 green onions, chopped
• 2 large garlic cloves, minced
• 1 or 2 tsp. fresh ginger, grated
• 1 tsp. red pepper flakes (use less if you don’t want it too spicy. I used guindillas)
• 3 tbsp. rice vinegar
• 2 tbsp. soy sauce
• 1 to 2 teaspoons sugar
• ½ cup roasted peanuts
• Chopped coriander leaves

Directions

In a large bowl combine chicken and cornstarch and stir until chicken is coated.

In another bowl, mix vinegar, soy sauce and sugar and set aside.

Heat a wok or large skillet over medium heat, add sesame oil. Once the oil is hot, add the chicken and sauté for until it is light golden brown. Remove the chicken from the wok.

Add to the wok garlic, ginger, pepper and green onions (leaving some of these last aside for the final presentation) and sauté everything for 30 seconds, stirring constantly. Add the mixture of soy sauce, vinegar and sugar, cooked chicken and peanuts. Stir to coat the chicken and peanut with the sauce.

To serve, sprinkle some chopped coriander and green onions on top.

The verdict: This dish was very easy and quick to make. Once you have the “rare” ingredients at hand, the rest is quite ordinary. I served this chicken for lunch today (well, actually yesterday…) and everybody loved it. The chicken is moist and very tasty. Maybe I added to much guindilla because it was quite spicy too, so beware.

I will be doing this recipe again very soon. We ate it with Chinese noodles, but I’m sure white rice will be even better companion.

Enjoy!