Chinese Chicken Recipes for Busy People

The first time I tried Beef Sukiyaki at a Japanese restaurant years ago, the waitress asked me if I would like it cooked in the kitchen or at my table. I chose the latter. I just wanted to see how it was done.  She brought the gas stove, a shallow pan, a large plate of raw ingredients to my table.  I saw her cooked the whole dish. My mouth was watery just watching it.   It was delicious.  I got hooked on Sukiyaki since then.  So whenever I tried out any new Japanese restaurants, I would order Sukiyaki, and I could tell if they serve authentic Japanese food or not.  You know, a lot Japanese restaurants are opened by Chinese, and they put fake stuff in it. LOL.   For example, instead of putting good cut of beef, they have London broil.  Instead of thinly sliced beef, the meat is like half an inch thick.  Instead of thick Japanese cellophane noodles, they put the skinny Chinese cellophane noodles.  Instead of using Japanese fresh shaiitaki mushrooms, they use Chinese dried shaiitaki mushrooms…. Ya, you can tell I have tried a lot of bad sukiyaki.  These days, I don’t go out to eat often, I started to make my own sukiyaki.  It probably costs me $25 or so to get all the good ingredients from a Japanese grocery store, but it’s all worth it.  I got the thinly sliced ribeye, tofu, mushrooms, veggies and Konnyaku noodles.  Konnyaku noodles are also called Shirataki noodles or miracle noodles.  It has zero calories.  I highly recommend Konnyaku noodles to anyone like me who craves noodles, and yet worry about the calories.

Beef Sukiyaki with Shirataki Miracle Noodles

Ingredients (Serves 2-3):

• Thinly sliced ribeye, 1 pound 
• Tofu, 1 pack
• Fresh Shaiitaki Mushrooms, 1 pack
• Enoki Mushrooms, 1 pack
• Chinese Bok Choy, 3 leaves
• Carrots, 3 sticks
• Onion, 1
• Garlic, 1 clove
• Scallion, 3 stems
• Konnyaku noodles (aka Shirataki noodles, or miracle noodles)
• Soy sauce, 1/2 cup
• Mirin, 1 Tbsp
• Sugar, 2 Tbsp
• Saki or Chinese Cooking wine, or white wine, 1 Tbsp
• Chicken Stock or water, 1 cup (chicken stock would make it tastier)

Note: If you don’t like beef, you can use other kind of meat like pork, or chicken.  You can also use all sort of other kinds of leafy veggies.

Steps:

1. Cut carrots, Chinese bok choy into bite size pieces.  Put it aside.
2. Cut onion into thin strips.  Put it aside.
3. Cut the root part of the enoki mushrooms, then break them into small chunks. Put them aside.
4. Cut tofu into big cubes (like 2 inches).  Put them aside.
5. Cut scallion into strips.  Put it aside.
6. Finely chopped the garlic. Put it aside.
7. Use a large shallow pan, or a frying pan.  Use high heat.  Spray cooking oil on the pan.  Lay beef slices in the pan. Let it cooked for a minute or so on each side. They cook fast since they are so thin.  Take it out from the pan when it is cooked. Put it aside.
8. Note that from this point onwards, you can put everything into the pan and cook them all at equal amount of time, or put them in at separate time like I did.
9. Put onion and garlic in the pan.  Stir fry it for couple of minutes.
10. Add carrots to the pan.  Add soy sauce, cooking wine and chicken stock to the pot.  Lower the heat to medium low. Put a lid on.  Let it cook for 10 minutes.  If you don’t have a big lid, just cover it with a piece of aluminum foil. That would work too.
11. Add shaiitaki mushrooms, tofu and sugar to the pan. Cover it and let it cook for 5 minutes.
12. Add noodles, and Chinese bok choy, mirin to the pan. Add the beef on the top.  Cover it and let it cook for another 2-3 minutes.
13. If the sauce gets too dry, you can add more water.  Taste it.  Add more soy sauce if needed.

I was so excited to visit the Nissin Ramen Noodles Museum in Japan last year. I love ramen noodles!

Fatty visited Nissin Ramen Noodles Museum

A lot of Ramen Noodles!

I ate so many Ramen noodles in my life that I’m really claiming myself to be an expert chef for cooking ramen noodles ;p LOL.  I take it seriously.  Mom may had cooked my Ramen noodles a few times, and she didn’t make it the way I like it.  I like it al dente!  If you undercook it, it’s like eating something fake, or plastic-like.  If you overcook it, it’s too soggy and it’s all gross IMHO.  If you add too much water for the soup, it doesn’t have much taste. If you add too little water, it gets too salty. It takes a lot of skills to make a good bowl of ramen noodles   I ate so much of these in my life because I grew up poor.  I’m still somewhat poor.. LOL.   It probably costs like 60 cents or so for a pack of noodles. Even if you make it fancy by adding some toppings on it, it is still like $1 or so for the meal. It’s a real poor man’s dish.  I remember I met some students from China back when I was doing my internship at a company.  The company subsidized all the students to stay in a hotel.  There was a pantry area in the hotel. We all gathered there for dinner.  I saw some Chinese guy there every night.  He would put the ramen noodle in a large plastic container, then add tap water in it, add the seasoning, and heat it up in a microwave.  YUCKY!  First of all, you can’t make good ramen noodles that way.  But the thing that really amazed me was that when his noodles were ready, he would open a jar of pickles and put one pickled cucumber in his noodles.  That’s his dinner!   He ate that every night.  He would have a few bites of noodles, and then had a small bite on the pickle as if it is something precious that he had to conserve.  Seeing that, I was like OMG and I thought I was broke!  There’s always someone that’s less fortunate!

Cooking Ramen Noodles

Ramen Noodles With Egg and Ham

Ingredients:

• Ramen Noodles, 1 pack.  I would recommend the Nissin Chicken noodles, or anything from Japan.  Nong Shim is also a good brand, they were made in Korea, and they are a lot spicier.
• Water, 6 cups
• Sesame oil (optional), a few drops

Steps:

1. Optional: if you are planning to add toppings to the noodles, you should prepare the toppings first.  Trust me, if you prepare the toppings after you cook the noodles, your noodles would turn so soggy that it may not look edible!  I like to add a cooked egg, a few pieces of ham or spam, or whatever leftover chicken etc.
2. To cook the noodles, add 6 cups of water in a pot.  Use high heat. Boil the water.
3. When the water boils, pour about 1.5-2 cups of water in a container. Save that for soup use.  You should have about 4 cups of boiled water in the pot.
4. Put the noodles into the pot.  Turn the heat back onto high.  Use a pork or a pair of chopsticks and give it a good stir. Make sure the noodles get separated easily.  Cook it for 2 minutes.  Turn off the heat.
5. Give the noodle a good stir, and discard the water.  Now you have drained noodles left in the pot.
6. Put the pot back to the stove.  Add the seasoning pack that comes along with the noodles in the pot.  Add the 1.5-2 cups of hot water to the pot.  Turn the heat back on to high.
7. Cook the noodles for 1 minute.  Turn off the heat.  Put the noodles in a serving bowl.
8. Optional: You can put a few drops of sesame oil to give it more flavor. 
9. Optional: put some toppings to the noodles.

Enjoy!  Eat it right away!

Somehow didn’t really feel like going out to get food today.  It’s one of those days that I would look at my pantry and see if there’s anything that can fill me up.  So I decided to make fried noodles.  This is not any fancy pan fried noodles that you order at a Chinese restaurant. This is another poor man’s food cos there isn’t much ingredients needed.  I had this as my breakfast occassionally when I was in middle/high school.  There were street hawkers selling fried noodles, congees and other goodies in the morning.  I would pay a few bucks for my fried noodles.  They put the noodles in a small white plastic bag, and stick a plastic folk in it, it’s totally unfancy.  I could put hot sauce or hoisin sauce in if I like.  I would eat that in the bus. By the time I got to school, I was done with breakfast.

Dried Noodles

Fried Noodles

Ingredients (serve 2 -3):

• Chinese dried noodles (prefer the skinny noodles, see the picture), 1/2 pound (which is half a bag)
• Ground meat, 1/4 pound (Optional. I usually use pork/beef, you can use chicken, or even turkey, or totally skip this)
• Carrot, 2 sticks
• Bok choy, 4 or 5 leaves
• Scallion, 4 stems
• Garlic, 1 clove
• Soy sauce, 1 tsp
• Chinese cooking wine, 1 tsp
• Fish sauce, 1 tsp
• Oyster sauce, 1 Tbsp
• Teriyaki sauce, 1 Tbsp
• Black bean sauce, 1 tsp
• Sesame oil, 1 tsp

Steps:

1. Cut the carrots into thin strips.  Put it aside.
2. Cut the bok choy into thin strips.  Put it aside.
3. Finely chopped the garlic.  Put it aside.
4. Cut the scallions into thin strips. Put it aside.
5. To prepare the sauce, add the following in a bowl and put it aside: oyster sauce, fish sauce, teriyaki sauce, and black bean sauce.
6. In a big pot, boil 8 or 9 cups of water.  Use high heat.  When the water boils, add the dried noodles.  Separate them with a fork or chopsticks.  Let it cooked for 5 mins or so. 
7. When the noodles are cooked. Turn off the heat.  Run it under cold water.  Rinse it with cold water for a couple of times to get rid of the starch.  Drain them well.
8. In a frying pan, add a tablespoon of cooking oil, or spray oil to the pan.  Use high heat. Add carrot. Stir fry it for 2 mins.
9. Add ground meat to the pan.  Stir fry it for a couple of minutes until it is cooked.  Add a teaspoon of cooking wine.  Add a teaspoon of soy sauce.  Mix it well.
10. Add bok choy to the pan.  Mix it well.
11. Add the drained noodles to the pan.  Turn down the heat to medium.
12. Add the sauce to the noodles.  Mix it well.  Stir fry the noodles for a couple of minutes. 
13. Add chopped scallion to the noodles.  Add a few drops of sesame oil.  Mix it well. Let it cook for 1 more minute.