Taiwanese Three Cup Chicken and Roasted Zucchini

I went into Flushing today to see my parents.  On the way I stopped at the Chinese supermarket across the street from the Flushing Library.  I have no idea what it's called, but it's huge, almost always crowded, and very cheap.  I don't know if it's this supermarket or Chinese supermarkets, in general, but I always feel that shopping at this location is an ordeal.  Walking in is a pain as multiple people leave at the same time, some with strollers, some with shopping carts, and all with the trademark red plastic bags.

In any case, being in Flushing made me remember the Taiwanese restaurant Gu-Shine.  If you're ever in the neighborhood, it is beyond cheap, filling and really quite good.  They have a fantastic dish called Taiwanese Three Cup Chicken (or sanbeiji in Mandarin).  (Although, it might actually be called chicken with basil on the menu).  

A few years ago, I decided to recreate the dish and found this recipe online on Allrecipes.com.  It's not the same as Gu-Shine's dish, but it's the closest thing I've found and delicious to boot.  This dish is also even better the next day if you pack it for lunch.  

Here are the ingredients that I used:

• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 and 1/2 pounds skinless chicken thighs cut into chunks
• 1/2 cup sesame oil
• 10 slices of fresh ginger
• 2 cloves of garlic sliced
• 1/2 cup white wine
• 1/3 cup soy sauce
• 1/4 cup water
• 3 tablespoons sugar
• 1/2 cup fresh basil leaves
• 1 jalapeno seeded and sliced (you can put in an extra one if you like things spicy)

In a large skillet heat the olive oil and brown the chicken things for about five minutes.  Take the thighs out and rest them on a plate.  Using the same pan, pour the sesame oil in and heat for a few minutes.  Add the garlic and ginger and heat for about 30 seconds until the ginger starts browning.   

At this point, return the chicken thighs to the pan and pour in the white wine, sugar, and soy sauce.

Wait for the mixture to boil and then lower the heat and simmer for about 20 minutes.  At this point, most of the sauce should have worked its way into the chicken thighs or evaporated.  Now it's time to put in the fresh basil leaves and jalapeno.  (Thank you basil plant that I got at the Green Market!)

Increase the heat to medium and keep cooking the chicken until most of the sauce is gone.

In the end, Taiwanese three cup chicken ends up being a savory, salty, and slightly spicy dish of chicken.  Really good Asian comfort food and perfect with a bowl of rice.

Of course, no bowl of chicken should be served without veggies, so I decided to make this very simple, but tasty roasted zucchini recipe.

I honestly think this is so easy and delicious that I might continue making this week after week.  Basically the only ingredients involved are zucchini, minced garlic, salt, freshly ground pepper, olive oil and an oven heated up to 450 degrees.  (Yes, I know, hot!)  Make sure that you use fresh zucchini.  I like arabic squash over the regular zucchini in the market.  I tend to find them sweeter and tastier.

The directions are as follows: Slice the zucchini length-wise and place on a pan that has been sprayed with non-stick spray.  At this point, pour some olive oil (I used about 2-3 tablespoons) over the zucchini and add the garlic.  Sprinkle some salt and freshly ground pepper over the zucchini.  Toss the mixture so that all the zucchini slices are well coated with oil. (Or in my case, move the mixture around with your hands.  Hey, it works!) Place the pan in the preheated oven and roast for about 5-8 minutes or until you see the zucchini start to brown.

Turkish Cuisine at Beyoglu

I'm sitting in my room right now after running home in the torrential downpour and wind.  I almost ran into a dude on a bike, who I'm sure cursed at me in some language.  In any case, I only have a cup of hot tea to keep me company, but I'm thankful that I'm dry now and inside where it's warm.  

Since it's too late to cook and since I'm pooped I'll talk about a delicious meal that I had yesterday at Beyoglu with my friend Patrick.  Beyoglu is basically my standby restaurant when I'm meeting someone on the Upper East Side for anything artsy fartsy (the Met, the Neue Galerie, or the Whitney to name a few).    It never fails.  It's a Turkish restaurant named after an area of Istanbul where there are a ton of consulates and quite a bit of shopping.  How do I know this?  I went to Turkey a few years ago and stayed a hotel in that area.  Here's a picture of the inside of the Blue Mosque in Istanbul for reference:

Beautiful isn't it?  Well, Turkish food is just as wonderful as the architecture.  Beyoglu, the restaurant, always makes me remember my trip and it never really fails to deliver.  

In terms of our meal last night, it first started off with a home-made pita bread which instead of being flat like I'm accustomed to in my Greek/Egyptian neighborhood, is dome-shaped.  As an appetizer they had manti as a special, which I enthusiastically ordered.  If you've never had manti, you really need to do yourself a favor and try some whenever you get a chance.  They are small, meat-filled dumplings covered with yogurt and a little bit of oil.  I know what you're thinking, you're thinking what kind of combination is that?  But no, it's really one of my favorite appetizers.  I've even had it courtesy of my friend's mom who is from Afghanistan, so I guess it's not a strictly Turkish dish.  

Here's the before:

And after:

Pretty soon afterward, in between five refills of water (talk about an attentive waitstaff), the main courses arrived.  Patrick had the doner kebab which consisted of thin slices of lamb and beef over rice pilaf accompanied by potatoes and sliced tomatoes.  I've had this dish in the past and my favorite part is when the fat from the lamb and beef combine with the rice pilaf, which itself is made with chicken broth and a bit of butter.  (Fat heaven!)   Patrick's response to his dish was, "This is really good!"

While, I myself wanted the doner kebab, I have a thing against everyone at the table ordering the same thing.  It just strikes me as boring and pointless.  (Variety is the spice of life!)  Therefore I decided to branch out and get the moussaka, which after a bit of googling seems to be more Greek than Turkish (but hey those, two countries are adjacent to each other, so I guess there's a lot of borrowing involved).  Moussaka in our waiter's words is a dish of chopped eggplant, ground beef and tomato sauce, which is then covered in cheese and baked.  I guess if I were to compare it to something, I'd say that if eggplant parmesan and lasagna mated, moussaka would be the love child.

Afterwards, Patrick and I were stuffed.  Turkish food, in my limited experience, tends to be filling if not overwhelming at times and our meal was no exception.  Tomorrow I may try to attempt making manti, if I can get my act together.   Stay tuned, friends!

Trader Joe's curry powder is my new best friend

I was in Trader Joe's two weeks ago looking for garam masala.  I didn't see that spice, but I did find curry powder, which in my head seemed close enough.  Looking at the ingredients it seemed like a decent substitute: cumin, turmeric, coriander, chili pepper mustard, cardamom, ginger, cloves, nutmeg, red pepper, cinnamon, black pepper, and saffron.  Wow, all of this for $1.99!  I was sold.

It's two weeks into cooking with TJ's curry powder now, and I gotta say that it's delicious.  Tonight I made a beef stir fry and added a teaspoon of the curry powder to the base sauce.  It was delectable.  Here's what I did:

Using my new America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook I flipped to page 359 "Beef and Broccoli Stir-Fry."  I more or less stuck to the recipe, omitting three things and substituting a few others.  Here are the ingredients I used:

• 2 teaspoons soy sauce
• 1/4 cup low sodium chicken broth
• 2 tablespoons of white wine
• 2 teaspoons of sugar
• 2 teaspoons sesame oil
• 2 teaspoon corn starch
• about a pound of good steak (I used sirloin)
• my other good friends salt 'n pepa
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 small zucchini, chopped whichever way you like
• 1 red bell pepper, stemmed, seeded, and chopped medium
• 1/3 cup water
• 6 garlic cloves
• 3 scallions
• 1 tablespoon grated ginger

First, before prepping anything, I put the steak in the freezer.  Why freeze the steak?  Well it's so that it'd be easy for slicing.  (Thank you informative side note in America's Test Kitchen cookbook).

Next I mixed the soy sauce, broth, white wine, sugar, sesame oil and corn starch together in a small bowl.  And since curry powder is my new best friend, I threw in a teaspoon of that in as well.

In the meantime while waiting on the steak in the freezer I prepped the zucchini, red bell peppers, garlic cloves, scallions, and ginger.  I put them in small bowls so that I could easily put them in at the right step.

Fast forward about 15-30 minutes and the the steak was just frozen enough.  I took it out, sliced it into two inch strips about 1/4 inch thick.  I guess this is your personal preference on how you want your meat sliced.  Sprinkle salt and freshly ground pepper over your meat.  Don't be shy about seasoning things.

At this point, it's time to cook the beef.  Put a tablespoon of oil (I like using olive oil because it makes me feel healthy) into a large non-stick pan on high heat.  Wait until it's smoking and throw in the beef.  In about five minutes it should be cooked more or less.   Remove the beef and place on a plate.

In the same frying pan, add the zucchini, bell pepper, and water.  Lower the heat to medium.  I cover my pan with a larger pan since none of my pans have covers.  (This is called being resourceful.)  In about 2-4 minutes, depending on how you sliced and diced things, your veggies should be cooked for the most part. I uncovered the pan at this point and cooked the veggies a bit more until most of the water has dried up.

Throw in the the last tablespoon of olive oil, the 6 cloves of garlic (kind of excessive now that I think about it), and the ginger.  This is my favorite part of cooking.  For some reason, when I start cooking the garlic and ginger in a recipe, it makes me feel like a real chef).  About 30 seconds to a minute later you should start smelling the garlic.  Now you should re-mix the curry/soy sauce mixture just to get the ingredients up and running again.  Pour it over the zucchini and red peppers.  Finally, add the sliced beef from before and cook until the ingredients meld and the beef is fully cooked.

Voila!  My dinner tonight was delicious.  I personally had my beef stir fry with brown rice, which I've discovered tastes really good and nutty in comparison to your generic white kind.

Prep time: Approximately 30 minutes (if you include the freezing of the beef)
Cooking time: 30 minutes