I’ve been stir-frying again. Regular readers will remember that this has long been a source of pleasure and pain round our house. Anyway for Christmas I asked for a book about Chinese cooking, so I could learn to do things proper like, and given that there are two Chinese supermarkets within 5 minutes walk of the flat, and I had no idea where I would be living / working by the end of the year, it seemed to be a good chance to get to explore the various foodstuffs, more and less exotic, available. So obviously I’ve only used the book twice so far, both in the last week or so, and both times only to cook chicken :-)
But, but, but I can report one (so far) totally ace discovery (the lesser discovery is the numminess of sesame oil as an ingredient): the virtues of feathering. Chop yr chicken. Mix with flour and egg white. Refrigerate (20 mins, or as long as it takes to chop all the other ingredients, basically). Put the pieces into a pan of boiling water, off the heat (oil worked better the first time, but seemed an unnecessary extravagance, and since the first batch was breast, the second thigh meet, I’ve no means of comparing the effects). Stir for two minutes. Drain, and set aside. Do the rest of the stir-fry stuff and then chuck in chicken pieces at the end, cook for a little longer. And lo and behold — chicken with that great takeaway texture, cooked through but still soft and not at all dried out. Num.
Inevitably, no change on the job front after all, and although we’re moving, it’s literally 20 seconds walk away. So hopefully more experiments in the future: and, of course, you’ll be the first to know, dear reader.