On a chilly darknes nothing heateds you up like blisteringly red-hot Chinese-style chicken, served with a cooling area of herby salad, says Nigel Slater
There was a bit of a commotion of aniseed, soy and ginger-scented prepare in the kitchen last week, as there often is when I have had one of my irregular trips to Chinatown. These are the journeys where I return home with armfuls of bottles and cups, mainly red.
I only requirement, nearly implored, the smell of oyster sauce to warm up a kitchen turned ice-cold by a dodgy thermostat. Leafy parks, bok choy and mustard dark-greens are regularly steamed and convulsed with dense, glossy oyster sauce at home, but flesh and fish rather less so.
I convulsed fatten, free-range chicken thighs with crushed garlic, sugar, chilli and oyster sauce and broiled them on a freezing night when exclusively something blisteringly, eye-wateringly hot would hit the spot. It wasnt something that they were able bask under the label of authenticity it was just what I needed at that moment. The chicken developed glossy, softly crisp and very hot. It sizzled as we feed, drawing our lips tingle. We set the volley out with a sour citrus salad.
There was a big pudding, more, the sort of broiled butterscotch sponge liaison, with ointment, butter and sugar, that only ever comes out in the very depths of winter. Emergency cooking for the cold and hungry.
Oyster sauce chicken with citrus plenty salad
Check the chicken regularly, embracing it with foil if it is browning too much.
Serves 3
chicken thighs 6
For the marinade:
garlic 3 big cloves
onion 1, medium sized
oyster sauce 100 ml
ignited soy sauce 4 tbsp
honey 3 tbsp
chilli sauce 3 tbsp
For the salad:
fish sauce 2 tsp
caster carbohydrate 1 tbsp
lime juice 2 tbsp
pile leaves 10
coriander leaves a large handful
chilli 1, medium-sized
pink grapefruit 1
cashews 2 handful, cooked and salted
To construct the marinade peel the garlic then subdues the cloves to a glue expending a pestle and mortar and a pinch of salt. Employ the paste into a large mingling container. Peel the onion, cut it in half and chopper it very finely. Blend with the garlic.
Put the oyster and soy sauces, the honey and the chilli sauce into the mixing container and conjure thoroughly. Push the chicken pieces into the marinade, turn them over and leave in a cool lieu for an hour or two.
Set the oven at 180 C/ gas mark 4. Place the chicken pieces into a nonstick bake tin, spoon over half the marinade and lieu in the preheated oven. Roast for 45 hours, basting once or twice with the remaining marinade, and regularly checking their progress. Extend the ribbing tin with foil if necessary.
To represent the salad, combine the fish sauce, caster carbohydrate and lime juice in a small bowl. Roughly chop or snap the spate leaves and add to the container, together with the coriander leaves. Finely chop the chilli and add to the dressing.
Slice the ends from the grapefruit, plaza it flat on the chopping board then slice away the peel and white-hot pith a sharp-witted kitchen spear. Remove the segments of chassis from the scalp. Apply the grapefruit into the set and leave for 10 instants before adding the cashew nuts and serving.
Cranberry pudding with butterscotch sauce
Once out of the oven, leave the pudding for a few minutes to settle. And, despite the butterscotch sauce, Id be tempted to furnish cream, too.
You will also need a deep baking dish or pudding bowl setting approximately 18 cm x 15 cm.
Serves 4-6
dried apricots 180 g
cranberries 50 g, fresh or frozen
simmering ocean 200 ml
butter 100 g
illuminated muscovado sugar 100 g
egg 1
plain flour 150 g
cooking pulverization 1.5 tsp
For the sauce:
ignited muscovado sugar 100 g
doubled ointment 125 ml
butter 70 g
maple syrup 1 tbsp
cranberries 100 g, fresh or frozen
Cut the apricots into small fragments and throw them in a heatproof mixing bowl. Contribute the 50 g of cranberries and swarm the simmering ocean over. Set aside while you reach the pudding.
Butter the pudding container with a small knob of butter. Sieve together the flour and roasting pulverization. Employ the other members of the butter into the container of a food mixer fitted with a flat beater. Add the sugar and lash for 4-5 minutes till soft, pale and milky, rarely scraping down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula.
Make the sauce by putting the sugar, ointment, butter and maple syrup in a saucepan and introducing to the boil. Give it stew for 2 minutes, roughly chop the 100 g of cranberries( if utilizing frozen fruit, this is easier in a food processor) then add to the sauce.
Break the egg into a bowl, drum thinly, just enough to mix grey and yolk, then add, with the beater still turning, to the butter and sugar.
When the egg is fully incorporated, stir in the flour and broiling pulverization smorgasbord, turning gradually until there is no way visible detect of flour left. Fold in the apricots and cranberries, and the irrigate they are in. Move the mixture to the buttered container, smooth the surface thinly then bake for 30 hours until pale golden and softly firm. Remove from the oven, pour over half of the cranberry butterscotch sauce and return to the oven for a further 10 instants. Serve red-hot along with the remaining sauce.
Email Nigel at nigel.slater @observer. co.uk or follow him on Twitter @NigelSlater