Thursday Dinner: Chicken with black vinegar sauce

Tonight, I used Chinese black vinegar to cook chicken. This recipe was taken from a recipe in a book, Le Creuset de oishii washoku (Cooking delicious Japanese food with le Creuset), by Yukiko Hirano with some adjustments.

I don't have a le creuset (although I do want one!), but I have an all-clad deep pan which should have the same kind of quality in terms of distributing heat and retaining it. I got my all-clad pan several months ago, but I still don't feel like I have really come to appreciate it. There must be recipes that all-clad pans/pots do wonderfully at, and I keep looking for recipes specialized for all-clad, but I can't seem to find any. According to the author of this book, cooking with le creuset requires far less liquid than other cookware and brings out the flavor of foods more. Theoretically speaking then, any type of "good quality" pots/pans with layers of steel and excellent heat distribution should have similar characteristics. So, I decided to try these recipes for le creuset with my all-clad and see what happens. I actually made broiled fish with all-clad and really could see the difference. Fish pieces stayed nice and firm as opposed to when I cook with my t-fal pan and they just fall apart after cooking for like few minutes.

Anyway, here is the recipe..

Chicken with black vinegar sauce (for 4 people - one chicken thigh piece each):
Chicken thigh (4 pieces)
Black vinegar (1/4 cup) - I found this at a Chinese store. You can use balsamic vinegar too.
Water (1/4 cup)
Sugar (1 Tbsp)
Soy sauce (2 Tbsp)
Mirin (1 Tbsp)
Salt
Pepper
Sesame oil (1 Tbsp)
Greens - I used Chinese broccoli. You can use pak choy, spinach, string beans, etc.

1. Pat dry chicken pieces. Put salt and pepper on both sides.
2. Heat a pan with sesame oil on medium high heat.
3. Grill chicken pieces on the pan until both sides are brown.
4. Add black vinegar. Once it boils, put water, soy sauce, sugar, and mirin.
5. Turn the heat down to low and put the lid on. After about 10 minutes, throw in greens (washed and cut as necessary). Cook until chicken pieces are completely cooked while steaming the vegetables.
6. Take chicken pieces and greens out, and turn the heat up to medium. Keep stirring until sauce thickens.

Although the sauce has vinegar in it, it doesn't taste sour at all. I served it with sekihan which means red rice in Japanese. Basically it's sweet rice (even more sticky than regular sticky rice - it's used for making rice cakes) cooked with red beans. My mom sent me this pre-packaged one where you just throw everything in a rice cooker and cook. Very easy and delicious.

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