Happy Easter Day, eat White Meat

Uni is having break for a week, the Easter break! I remember working at Annelouise's dad fish shop last April during eve of Easter, she mentioned that it was a Catholic tradition for them to just eat white meat on Easter, not exactly sure why though, but anyways i thought, hmm.. i shall cook Hainanese Chicken Rice tonight for dinner then! since i had freshly made hot cross buns from Barretts bakery, for breakfast.

I made the chicken broth and chicken rice from scratch, not that difficult, ingredients were basic. This fabulous receipe was extracted from lady 'Gastronomy Domine' blog, i did some alterations to the original receipe to cater Z's tastebuds. To add some vegetables as a side, i boiled the bean sprouts remaining from Vietnamese day in the Chicken Broth! As it was Easter holiday, i couldn't buy Rice Wine from the nearby Chinese grocer, so i just omitted it, i'm it would have tasted even better with it though, anyways, do have a sneak peek at my homemade Hainanese Chicken Rice & i have attached the receipe that i used.

To make Chicken and soup mixture (serves 5 pax)
One chicken, without giblets
Four pints water
Chicken stock cube or 500 ml Chicken stock
One teaspoon salt
Wine glass of Shaoxing rice wine
Two tablespoons of light soy sauce
Thumb-sized piece of ginger, sliced
Ten cloves of garlic, squashed lightly with a knife blade
Two large spring onions (scallions)

To make Rice
One tablespoon rendered chicken fat (see below)
Thai Jasmine Rice
Chicken soup mixture (amt would be the same as how much water you would normally use to cook rice)

1. Begin by bringing the water, stock, salt, rice wine and soy sauce to a boil. Pull out any poultry fat from the inside of the chicken, and put it in a dry frying pan on a medium heat to render out the fat.

2. Stuff the chicken with the ginger, garlic and spring onions, and place it in the pot of boiling mix. Bring back to the boil for two minutes uncovered, then put the lid on and simmer for 40 minutes.

3. When the chicken has been poaching for forty minutes, remove it from the chicken soup mixture and very importantly, throw the chicken into a cold bath. This would lock in the tenderness of the chicken.

4. Put the rendered fat into uncooked rice, stir well to make sure all the grains are coated, and fill the rice cooker with the chicken soup mixture sufficiently, as you usually would with water. To add more fragrance to the rice, put about 1 clove of garlic and ginger (peeled and smashed lightly) into the rice cooker.

5. Slice some cucumber, tomatoes and lettuce for garnish, you could also use some of the freshly cut spring onions from leftovers. If the dish taste a little bland, i would suggest some sesame oil over the chicken. You may also steam or boil greens like Bok Choy or other chinese vegetables for your daily dose of fibre!

Have fun!