Japanese cooking; Teriyaki Chicken
In previous entry titled "Bento box culture in Japan ", I wrote that lunch
box is called "Bento" in Japanese, and it is part of Japanese culture and,usually,
parents get up early and make Bento box for kids to bring to school. Also, many grown up people bring Bento box to work, too.
One of the popular Bento box food was Teriyaki chicken or anything that has Teriyaki flavor to it. You could find those food in many of lunch boxes around you. In fact, Teriyaki sauce is staple/popular flavor in Japan and if you go to Japanese burger joints, you can find Teriyaki Burgers to die for. Whenever we back to Japan, one thing we do is to go to burger joint there and indulge ourselves to our favorite Teriyaki burgers, Shrimp burgers etc..
People here in the states seem to love Teriyaki sauce and seem to enjoy shrimp a lot and, I always think that if one of the burger joints here in the states start selling Teriyaki burgers, shrimp burger, they would have loooong line in front of the stores.
Last Christmas, I usually make Pizza for in-law family every year,but l made "shrimp burgers" for a change. It was huge hit and, my stumpy little "Palette" was laying on floor with wet nose near us hoping for a tiny nibble.
Since I cannot get yummy Teriyaki burger,shrimp burger here in the states, I make them now and then. If you like to see the recipe of those two burgers, you can see the recipe in the previous entry titled "Japanese cooking; Ebi Katsu burger,Katsu burger,and Teriyaki burger ".
I like those burgers a lot but it is not healthy to eat them day in day out. So, I enjoy Teriyaki flavored dish sometimes. One of the Teriyaki flavored dish I make is Teriyaki Chicken.
Teriyaki sauce does not need complicated ingredients at all. All you need is 5 ingredients plus whatever you like to cook with; meat, vegetable etc.. You can be creative on how you use the sauce for too.
You can make meatball and you can add vegetable and add thickened Teriyaki sauce. Or, next day, you can just make pasta and add to the left over meatball and vegetable. Or.. you can grill the Frank steak with simple salt & pepper and slice thin against the grain and toss those in Teriyaki sauce. You can saute vegetable and chopped chicken in skillet and toss plain cooked white rice and you can drizzle Teriyaki sauce and voila! You made Teriyaki fried rice. If you have pizza night, you can thicken up the Teriyaki sauce and use it in stead of pizza sauce.. As long as meat has no strong unique flavor like lamb or Turkey, I think this sauce can go well with any meat or sea food.
You can order "Teriyaki chicken" at restaurant but do not need to spend a lot to taste them. It seems average price to pay for Teriyaki chicken dish runs about $7-$8 at most restaurant, but you can make them lot cheaper.
So, how do you make Teriyaki Chicken? Here is how.
You can make Teriyaki Chicken with rice and have some vegetable side dishes, soup,salad to go with it.
Teriyaki chicken with Kokuho Rose White Rice..
Or..
Make it a little fancier and better on the each plate, you can sprinkle freshly ground sesame seed over the chicken.
Teriyaki sesame chicken strip with sauteed vegetable and brown rice..
1. Place big non stick skillet over stove and preheat with dash of sesame oil with low heat while you are working on the chicken
2. Butterfly the chicken breast and cut in the center
###How to Butterfly the chicken breast###
1. Place the boneless chicken breast on cutting board,smooth side up
2.Hold the smooth side with one hand, cut the breast horizontally from side of the breast
** working way out to the edge with top to down motion and roll top piece over as you go is easier
3.When chicken breast is butterflied (looks like a book), cut the piece in center and make 2 pieces out from one chicken breast
** Other way to make 2 pieces out from one chicken breast is simply pound the chicken breast to thin and cut to two pieces
##################################
3. Pound boneless chicken thigh a little
4. Sprinkle Molton's Nature's Season (blue cap seasoning bottle) over chicken breast and thigh
5. Sprinkle Molton's Nature's Season (blue cap seasoning bottle) into all purpose flour in the bowl and mix well
6. Dip chicken breast and thigh into flour and seasoning mix and pat to take excess flour off and put those to plate
7. When dredging chicken breast and thigh into flour and seasoning mixture are close to finish, bring the heat to medium high and make the skillet hot enough to hear the sizzle when you place the chicken onto the skillet
8. When skillet is hot enough, place the chicken on skillet and let it cook.
** Don't push chicken, don't move it around..
** To know when is hot enough, you can wash your hands and splash a bit of water onto the skillet and if it were hot enough, you will hear the big sizzling sound
9. While chicken is cooked in the pan, work on the sauce..
-------<Teriyaki sauce>--------
Mix 2 tbs of sake,2 tbs of Mirin, 3 tbs of soy sauce, 2 tbs of sugar in the small container
You may wonder what essential ingredients in Japanese cooking look like. Here are the pictures.
Sake..
** You can find these at local grocery stores..
Extra fancy whole bean soy sauce..
** You can find these at Asian stores..
Jozo Mirin (Sweet Rice Wine)..
** You can find these at Asian stores.. The Mirin I use had Food label translated into English and it had "Sweet cooking rice seasoning" as product name. So, some store might sell with the name if you seem not find Mirin on shelf.
---------------------------
9. When chicken is 80% done, flip each chicken breast and thigh and add splash of sake and shake the skillet a little back and forth and let the sake evaporate a little and turn the heat down to low heat and put the lid into the skillet to steam.
** You can use any lids for any pans. It just need to be smaller than the skillet surface for lid edge to be able to touch the skillet. And make sure that lid has steam hole so that air inside can escape through the hole.
10. Wait about 2 minutes or till the sake you splashed will evaporate completely.
** Adding splash of alcohol to the skillet and cook this way can intensify the flavor, and makes really good dish plus it also makes meat very tender
11. After sake is evaporated completely and steamed under smaller sized lid, add Teriyaki sauce mixture and cook through.
12. After chicken is cooked through, add dash of sesame oil and serve.
** If you like to sprinkle sesame seed, I usually use sesame seed grinder. Since I grind sesame seed, I do not bite into big whole sesame seed. And, it adds more flavor to the dish.
Sesame seed grinder
** You can find these at Asian stores. How you use it is to fill the grinder with toasted sesame seed,pop the red cap off on top and tilt it over food and hold the white grinder handle on top and move it to ground.My mother use the same tool in Japan.
Bon appetit!
One of the popular Bento box food was Teriyaki chicken or anything that has Teriyaki flavor to it. You could find those food in many of lunch boxes around you. In fact, Teriyaki sauce is staple/popular flavor in Japan and if you go to Japanese burger joints, you can find Teriyaki Burgers to die for. Whenever we back to Japan, one thing we do is to go to burger joint there and indulge ourselves to our favorite Teriyaki burgers, Shrimp burgers etc..
People here in the states seem to love Teriyaki sauce and seem to enjoy shrimp a lot and, I always think that if one of the burger joints here in the states start selling Teriyaki burgers, shrimp burger, they would have loooong line in front of the stores.
Last Christmas, I usually make Pizza for in-law family every year,but l made "shrimp burgers" for a change. It was huge hit and, my stumpy little "Palette" was laying on floor with wet nose near us hoping for a tiny nibble.
Since I cannot get yummy Teriyaki burger,shrimp burger here in the states, I make them now and then. If you like to see the recipe of those two burgers, you can see the recipe in the previous entry titled "Japanese cooking; Ebi Katsu burger,Katsu burger,and Teriyaki burger ".
I like those burgers a lot but it is not healthy to eat them day in day out. So, I enjoy Teriyaki flavored dish sometimes. One of the Teriyaki flavored dish I make is Teriyaki Chicken.
Teriyaki sauce does not need complicated ingredients at all. All you need is 5 ingredients plus whatever you like to cook with; meat, vegetable etc.. You can be creative on how you use the sauce for too.
You can make meatball and you can add vegetable and add thickened Teriyaki sauce. Or, next day, you can just make pasta and add to the left over meatball and vegetable. Or.. you can grill the Frank steak with simple salt & pepper and slice thin against the grain and toss those in Teriyaki sauce. You can saute vegetable and chopped chicken in skillet and toss plain cooked white rice and you can drizzle Teriyaki sauce and voila! You made Teriyaki fried rice. If you have pizza night, you can thicken up the Teriyaki sauce and use it in stead of pizza sauce.. As long as meat has no strong unique flavor like lamb or Turkey, I think this sauce can go well with any meat or sea food.
You can order "Teriyaki chicken" at restaurant but do not need to spend a lot to taste them. It seems average price to pay for Teriyaki chicken dish runs about $7-$8 at most restaurant, but you can make them lot cheaper.
So, how do you make Teriyaki Chicken? Here is how.
You can make Teriyaki Chicken with rice and have some vegetable side dishes, soup,salad to go with it.
Teriyaki chicken with Kokuho Rose White Rice..
Or..
Make it a little fancier and better on the each plate, you can sprinkle freshly ground sesame seed over the chicken.
Teriyaki sesame chicken strip with sauteed vegetable and brown rice..
1. Place big non stick skillet over stove and preheat with dash of sesame oil with low heat while you are working on the chicken
2. Butterfly the chicken breast and cut in the center
###How to Butterfly the chicken breast###
1. Place the boneless chicken breast on cutting board,smooth side up
2.Hold the smooth side with one hand, cut the breast horizontally from side of the breast
** working way out to the edge with top to down motion and roll top piece over as you go is easier
3.When chicken breast is butterflied (looks like a book), cut the piece in center and make 2 pieces out from one chicken breast
** Other way to make 2 pieces out from one chicken breast is simply pound the chicken breast to thin and cut to two pieces
##################################
3. Pound boneless chicken thigh a little
4. Sprinkle Molton's Nature's Season (blue cap seasoning bottle) over chicken breast and thigh
5. Sprinkle Molton's Nature's Season (blue cap seasoning bottle) into all purpose flour in the bowl and mix well
6. Dip chicken breast and thigh into flour and seasoning mix and pat to take excess flour off and put those to plate
7. When dredging chicken breast and thigh into flour and seasoning mixture are close to finish, bring the heat to medium high and make the skillet hot enough to hear the sizzle when you place the chicken onto the skillet
8. When skillet is hot enough, place the chicken on skillet and let it cook.
** Don't push chicken, don't move it around..
** To know when is hot enough, you can wash your hands and splash a bit of water onto the skillet and if it were hot enough, you will hear the big sizzling sound
9. While chicken is cooked in the pan, work on the sauce..
-------<Teriyaki sauce>--------
Mix 2 tbs of sake,2 tbs of Mirin, 3 tbs of soy sauce, 2 tbs of sugar in the small container
You may wonder what essential ingredients in Japanese cooking look like. Here are the pictures.
Sake..
** You can find these at local grocery stores..
Extra fancy whole bean soy sauce..
** You can find these at Asian stores..
Jozo Mirin (Sweet Rice Wine)..
** You can find these at Asian stores.. The Mirin I use had Food label translated into English and it had "Sweet cooking rice seasoning" as product name. So, some store might sell with the name if you seem not find Mirin on shelf.
---------------------------
9. When chicken is 80% done, flip each chicken breast and thigh and add splash of sake and shake the skillet a little back and forth and let the sake evaporate a little and turn the heat down to low heat and put the lid into the skillet to steam.
** You can use any lids for any pans. It just need to be smaller than the skillet surface for lid edge to be able to touch the skillet. And make sure that lid has steam hole so that air inside can escape through the hole.
10. Wait about 2 minutes or till the sake you splashed will evaporate completely.
** Adding splash of alcohol to the skillet and cook this way can intensify the flavor, and makes really good dish plus it also makes meat very tender
11. After sake is evaporated completely and steamed under smaller sized lid, add Teriyaki sauce mixture and cook through.
12. After chicken is cooked through, add dash of sesame oil and serve.
** If you like to sprinkle sesame seed, I usually use sesame seed grinder. Since I grind sesame seed, I do not bite into big whole sesame seed. And, it adds more flavor to the dish.
Sesame seed grinder
** You can find these at Asian stores. How you use it is to fill the grinder with toasted sesame seed,pop the red cap off on top and tilt it over food and hold the white grinder handle on top and move it to ground.My mother use the same tool in Japan.
Bon appetit!
Posted by yassy at 9/16/2010 2:58 PM 
Categories: Asian cooking 911
Tags: teriyaki sauce japanese cooking chicken food
Categories: Asian cooking 911
Tags: teriyaki sauce japanese cooking chicken food
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