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No claypot chicken rice

No claypot chicken rice

Because our donabe (Japanese claypot) is too small to cook a meal for four, my chicken rice was cooked in a cast iron pan. Chinese sausage, mushrooms and bok choy complete the dish.
Course Main Course
Cuisine Chinese
Keyword Rice bowl
Prep Time 20 minutes
Cook Time 40 minutes
Marinating / soaking 6 hours
Total Time 7 hours
Servings 4 people

Ingredients

Chicken

  • 4 to 8 chicken drumsticks or thighs (about 800 grams / 1.7 pounds) bone-in
  • 1 tablespoon rice wine
  • 1 tablespoon salt
  • ½ teaspoon Chinese five-spice powder
  • ¼ teaspoon grated ginger

Toppings

  • 8 dried shiitake
  • 2 Chinese sausages
  • 4 bunches bok choy

Rice

  • 1 ½ cups medium-grain rice
  • 1 cup chicken broth unsalted
  • 1 cup mushroom soaking water

To brown the chicken and make the sauce

  • 2 tablespoons cornstarch
  • cooking oil
  • 1 onion peeled and chopped
  • 4 cloves garlic chopped
  • 3 tablespoons soy sauce
  • 1 tablespoon brown sugar
  • 2 tablespoons oyster sauce
  • 1 teaspoon sesame seed oil

Instructions

Prep the chicken and mushrooms

  • Wipe the chicken dry with paper towels.
  • Place the chicken in a bowl, add the rice wine, salt, five-spice powder and ginger, and mix well.
  • Cover the bowl and marinate the chicken in the fridge for six hours.
  • Soak the dried mushrooms in warm water for six hours.

Prep the rest of the toppings

  • Slice the Chinese sausages.
  • Cut each bunch of bok choy into halves vertically and rinse to remove and silt trapped between the stalks.

Parboil the rice

  • Spread the rice on thick-bottomed pan.
    Pouring broth over rice in cast iron pan
  • Pour in the chicken broth and mushroom soaking water.
  • Cover and cook the rice just until the liquids have been absorbed.

Brown the chicken

  • Take the chicken out of the fridge and toss with the corn starch. Shake off the excess.
  • In a wok or frying pan, heat enough cooking oil to reach a depth of at least three inches.
  • Brown the chicken, in batches if necessary, until a light crust forms on the surface (you're not cooking the chicken all the way through at this point).
    Frying chicken drumsticks

Make the sauce

  • Pour off the oil in the pan leaving only a tablespoonful.
  • Saute the onion and garlic just until softened.
    Sauteeing onion, garlic and fried chicken
  • Add the chicken and cook, tossing, for a minute.
  • Pour in the soy sauce and sprinkle in the brown sugar.
    Sprinkling brown sugar over chicken in pan
  • Add the oyster sauce and cook, tossing, until the sugar is completely dissolved.
  • Stir in the sesame seed oil.

Assemble and finish cooking

  • Arrange the chicken on top of the rice on one side of the pan.
    Arranging fried chicken over half-cooked rice in cast iron pan
  • Drizzle the sauce over the chicken and rice.
  • Spread the mushrooms and Chinese sausages beside the chicken.
    Adding mushrooms and Chinese sausage to chicken over rice in pan
  • Arrange the bok choy on the side opposite the chicken.
  • Pour half a cup of water along the edge of the pan.
    Pouring water into rice in pan
  • Cover the pan tightly and, with the heat set on low, cook everything together until the rice fully cooked (the chicken should be fully cooked too at this point).

Serve

  • Ladle rice, chicken, sausage slices, mushrooms and bok choy into bowls and serve.
    No claypot chicken rice