Hong Kong Chicken - Braai Style

Everything tasted better when I was younger.  Or so it seemed,  nothing beat egg and bacon sandwiches on the beach under the umbrella if it was raining.  Crispy fish and chips with vinegar.  Spur burgers with unlimited salad and BBQ sauce.  Hong Kong chicken at the local Chinese with sweet sticky sauce.  And nothing makes me miss something more than not being able to get it anymore which applies to HK chicken.  Damn that redevelopment on those awful row of shops in central Cape Town.

Or so I thought until, I saw Hollow Leg's Blog (www.lizzieeatslondon.blogspot.co.uk) and the following recipe (so happy so very happy) so here is my version of the recipe which I use as unusual Canapes!

• 800g chicken wings
• 5 cloves of garlic
• 3 – 5 slices of ginger root (peeled)
• 2 tbsp dark soy sauce
• 2 tbsp light soy sauce
• 2 – 3 star anise
• 1 can of coke (full fat not diet or flavoured pls)
• 2bsp of veggie oil (sunflower for me)
• Spring onions

Cut the chicken wings into two pieces (leaving a drumstick and the other triangle shaped piece) and marinade in the dark soy sauce for up to 24 hours. 

Crush the garlic, chop the ginger root into small pieces and remove the whites from spring onions (chopping finely)

Pop the marinated chicken into a hot wok filled with the veggie oil and brown

Remove the chicken, add the garlic etc. and the star anise.  Gently fry until golden.

Then add the chicken, any soy sauce mixture left as well as the can of coke.

Cook for about 20 minutes until the chicken is cooked and the sauce is glossy.

If the sauce is too thin, remove the chicken towards the end of the cooking process and allow to boil down

Serve the chicken covered with the glossy sauce and with a garnish of spring onion greens.

courtesy of chinesefoodrecipes.org

Now, as a South African I love my Braai (BBQ) so I also tried the following................... 

• Leave the chicken wings whole but stretch them out and use a wooden skewer (soaked in water for about 20 minutes) to fix them in place if this doesn’t happen naturally
• Marinate the chicken in the dark soy sauce but add a little more to compensate for anything that the skewers soak up.
• Now create the sauce as above excluding the chicken but pouring the marinade into the wok.
• Cook the chicken in the oven at the same time until cooked through.  It should not be too crispy so the heat should not be too high.  Remove the chicken and set aside.
• Boil the sauce down over a medium heat until it becomes glossy and coat the chicken wings with resulting sauce.
• Then pop on a hot BBQ/braai for about 5 minutes to crisp up, heat through and even catch slightly.
• You can prepare this up until the final stage ahead of time and then serve as a tasty canapé around the braai.

So very yummy

L xxx

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