Steamed Chicken Rice, Almost Hainanese Style

My home-cooked Chicken rice – complete with condiments (chilli sauce, ginger sauce) and herbal (dang gui) chicken soup.

Note: The following post comes with the recipes for steamed chicken, chicken rice, ginger sauce, chilli sauce, sesame oil sauce and herbal chicken broth. Serves 3.

This is my take on perhaps Singapore’s most popular food, the Hainanese chicken rice. I think Hainanese chicken rice is arguably our most famous national dish. My way of preparing chicken rice is “almost Hainanese”, because the method of preparing the chicken is not quite Hainanese way of dipping in hot water to gently cook the chicken, or the more Singaporean way of boiling the chicken. Instead, I steamed the chicken, which is how my mum prepares her chicken rice. This method is easy, and yet it still retains the juiciness of the chicken. Somehow, the taste is close.

Though there are countless delicious chicken rice stalls in Singapore, there is just something about home-made chicken rice that is so familiar and yet so unique, that I can’t put down a reason why I find the home cooked version so satisfying. I also love the fact that I can make my chilli sauce really hot to suit my fiery threshold for spicy foods … the chilli sauce outside is, in my opinion, often tamed to cater to the general eaters. I have experimented with making this a few times and document the quantities carefully so I think the following recipes are really tried-and-tested.

A) STEAMED CHICKEN
Ingredients
- 1 kampong chicken (you can use regular chicken, or bigger chicken if serving more people)
- 1.5 bulbs garlic (separated to cloves and slightly bruised with mortar and pestle to release the flavour)
- 3 stalks spring onions, cut to 2 inch lengths
- 10 slices ginger
- sea salt

Directions
- Chop off the (dead!) chicken’s head n feet. Reserve feet for making chicken soup at the end. Clean the inside, empty innards if this hasn’t been done by your butcher (usually they are already cleaned). Rinse chicken thoroughly and pat dry with paper towels.
- Rub salt all over the chicken.
- Stuff cavity with garlic cloves (about 1 bulb worth) , 5 slices ginger and half of the spring onions.
- In a deep and wide dish (chicken broth will be collected at the end of cooking), placed the remaining garlic, spring onions and ginger at the bottom of the dish. Then place the chicken on top.
- Steam in a covered steamer over high heat for 40-50minutes. Watch the water inside the steamer, adding more water in the steamer dish if it has evaporated.
- To test if the chicken is cooked, insert a fork in the thigh area. If clear liquid (no blood) runs out, it is cooked.
- A substantial amount of concentrated chicken broth will be collected in the dish – this is really good stuff so DO NOT THROW AWAY the chicken broth. Empty the cavity liquids into the broth pool.
- When chicken has cooled, carve the chicken and set aside the bones. DO NOT THROW AWAY the bones as well as you need it to make the herbal chicken broth.

B) CHICKEN RICE
Ingredients
– 1 3/4 cup rice, rinsed
-  broth from cooking the chicken (reserve some for recipe C2 & C3, add more water/msg-free chicken cube stock if needed)*
- 5 cloves garlic, slightly bruised
- 5 slices ginger
- 1 pandan leaf, tied in a knot

Directions
- Cook rice in rice cooker using the above ingredients.
* For the quantity of broth to add, follow the usual amount of water as you would to cook plain rice (mine is slightly less than 2 cups).

C) Recipes for Chicken Rice Accompaniers
1) GINGER SAUCE
(Note: My recipes for ginger sauce and chilli sauce is adapted from wokking mum)

This is a dipping sauce for the steamed chicken. I think the taste resembles Soup Restaurant’s ginger sauce for its Samsui Chicken.

Ingredients
- 50g ginger, scrap off skin with spoon and cut to slices
- 2 tbsp sesame oil
- salt

Directions
Blend ginger till fine. Place blended ginger in serving dish, add sesame oil and season with a bit of salt.

2) CHILLI SAUCE
This is the chilli sauce that resembles the type that is served with Hainanese chicken rice. Except for the fact that maybe mine is a little hotter because I just love it hot :P

Ingredients
- 3 tbsp chicken broth
- 4 chilli padi, deseeded (adjust according to how hot you like it)
- 2 limes
- 5 garlic cloves
- 1 slice ginger

Directions
Blend everything together except lime. Pour into serving dish and squeeze lime juice. Combine well.

3) SESAME SAUCE
The sesame sauce is used for drizzling over the chicken and chicken rice just before serving to prevent dryness. Also adds more flavour as a finishing touch to the dish.

Ingredients
- 1 tsp sesame oil
- 3-5 tbsp chicken broth (if you don’t have enough broth for this, you can consider using chicken cube, or reduce broth and add some water)

Directions
Mix till the sesame oil is dissolved in the broth and is diluted.

4) CHICKEN DANG GUI SOUP
I hate to waste the bones after carving the chicken. In my kitchen, nothing goes to waste. My twist to the usual chicken broth that accompanies the Hainanese chicken rice is to add a herbal touch (with the addition of the Chinese herb dang gui) to it. Admittedly, this is a bit tedious to prepare, but I believe the result is well worth it because it tastes so herby, so delicious and so luxurious.

Ingredients
- chicken carcass after carving, feet and bones (include the wing tips)
- 1.2 l water
- 6 pieces dang gui
- 1 carrot, peeled and sliced
- chicken broth if you still have any left (or a small piece of msg-free chicken cube)
- 1/2 tbsp wolfberries

Directions
- Bring everything except wolfberries to a rapid boil for 10 minutes. Reduce to simmering heat for 30 minutes.
- Add wolfberries and simmer for a further 10 minutes before serving.
- Discard bones.

TO SERVE & ASSEMBLE EVERYTHING
Ingredients
- 1/3 cucumber, cut to half lengthwise, then slice thinly diagonally
- 1/2 tomato, sliced thinly
- coriander
- spring onions, cut cross section lengthwise
- earlier prepared items A, B and C1 to C4

Directions
- To assemble the dish, scoop a bowl of cooked chicken rice on plate. Place cooked chicken over the rice. Drizzle with the sesame sauce just before serving.
- Garnish with sliced cucumbers, tomatoes, coriander and spring onions.
- Serve chicken rice with chilli sauce, ginger sauce, dark soy sauce and herbal chicken broth.

No decent Chicken rice (or any Singapore dishes for the matter of fact) will be complete without the condiments and sauces.

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Tagged as: carrot, Chicken, Chinese Herbs, cucumber, ginger, Rice, sesame oil, spring onion, tomato