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Succulent, gently poached chicken, soothing soup, fragrant rice and a sparkly ginger-scallion sauce. What’s not to love?
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Do you have a dish you love so much that you collect recipes for it? Something that you always want to eat, that always sounds good. So good that you look for different versions, noting their similarities and differences, trying them all to see which one you like best, which version is the ideal version for that day, for your energy level, for what you have in the fridge and pantry.
I have several gotta-cook-’em-all dishes, and they’re all chicken-and-rice-based: chicken adobo, Japanese-style chicken curry and, my current muse, Hainan chicken rice. Unlike adobo or curry, which essentially simmer away after a meager amount of prep, Hainan chicken rice can involve a lot of steps. None of them are difficult, but they can eat up an afternoon, making it the perfect thing for a winter weekend.
The yield is fantastic: perfect, succulent chicken that’s had an aromatic soak with ginger, scallions and garlic; soothing chicken soup; rice that’s been cooked in some of said soup with pandan leaves; and a sparkly ginger-scallion sauce. Hainan chicken rice is maybe my favorite chicken dish — nourishing but not heavy, comforting but not cloying. And the elements branch out into helpful leftovers. The rice becomes fried rice, of course; the chicken goes into any number of applications; the soup is stock for stew (or curry!); and the ginger-scallion sauce is tossed with noodles for a stellar lunch.
All of which is to say: I’m very excited to add Kevin Pang’s recipe to my collection.
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Hainan Chicken Rice
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Before we move on, I want to call out Genevieve Ko’s ginger scallion chicken and rice and Sue Li’s chicken and rice with scallion-ginger sauce as excellent Hainan chicken rice shortcuts. They both feature gently cooked chicken with fragrant rice and a ginger-scallion situation, but with total cook times that wouldn’t feel insane on a Wednesday.
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