Pak Cham Kai and chicken rice

Normally, pak cham kai is cooked by boiling the chicken but I prefer to steam it so that the taste and goodness are preserved. I like to use chicken with yellowish coloured skin. I always believed that the colour was because the chicken was given corn based feed, but my chicken seller told me that the colour was because the chickens were fed turmeric. This is good news because turmeric’s active ingredient, curcumin is found to help remove plaques from brain cells that could otherwise interfere with your brain's “wiring”. Curcumin therefore helps to reduce the risk of dementia. That is why it is also good to eat curry frequently.

Ingredients

½ a chicken

1 large piece of ginger – sliced thickly and crushed

4 cloves of garlic – crushed

Sesame oil

For the marinade:

Shaoxing rice wine

Light soy sauce

Pepper

Salt to taste

 Mix the marinade and rub all over the chicken

Leave to stand for about an hour

Put some ginger slices and garlic under the thigh and wing of the chicken

Put the remaining ginger slices and garlic on a heat proof plate

Place the chicken on the ginger and garlic

Place the plate in the steamer

Cover and steam the chicken until cooked

Every now and then spoon the chicken juices over the chicken so that it will be moist and tasty

Once the chicken is cooked, remove the chicken from the plate and use the liquid to cook chicken rice

Allow to cool and then rub some sesame oil all over the chicken. Cut into bite size pieces and pour the fried ginger strips over the chicken

To cook the chicken rice

This is the bottled version of chicken rice paste

I do not use the oil as I find the rice is tastier if cooked with butter

This is the packet version which has less oil

Wash the rice and add the chicken rice paste

Put in 1 bulb of garlic and a knob of butter

Stir the rice half way through the cooking process to mix in the ingredients

When the rice is cooked, stir it again so that it will be fluffy

 Dish up a plateful and serve with a piece of chicken for the child

What to do with the left over chicken?

Fry some thinly sliced ginger with sesame oil

Put in the chicken and stir fry

Add some dark soy sauce, oyster sauce, a little salt and sugar

Add a little water

Mix thoroughly 

Dish up and serve