(Faux Claypot) Chicken, Mushroom and Chinese Sausage Rice

Traditionally this dish is normally cooked in a claypot, one of the kitchen toys however I unfortunately don’t have, so this is a variation on the dish. A dish of Chinese origin, it evokes a fond food memory of home and comfort food for alot of people, with it’s combination of sweet and salty, savoury juices.

While this dish is quite simple, it does require a little bit of fore-planning. The mushrooms themselves are normally dehydrated, so it’s a matter of soaking these little guys in a bowl of water for 2 hours or so, to rehydrate them. Afterwards however they pack so much flavour. Once you have allowed them to soak, take off the stalk and either rehyrdate them further and cut them a little finer while they soak, as they take alot longer to rehydrate then the caps.

What really makes this dish is the Chinese sausage or lap cheong. While not the healthiest item on the menu and certainly not what most Westerners think when they menioning a sausage, they’re packed with so much flavour, their a great addition to the dish.

INGREDIENTS

Jasmine rice to whatever number of bowls you need

A dozen dried Chinese mushrooms, soaked for atleast 2 hours
3x lap cheong sausages, sliced into half cm pieces
500g boneless thighs
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1 tablespoon Chinese rice wine
1 tablespoon dark soy sauce
1 tablespoon light soy sauce
1 tablespoon sesame oil
1 tablespoon of oyster sauce
1 teaspoon of sugar
1 teaspoon of salt and pepper to taste

Saucy

METHOD

– This dish can be made relatively quickly, outside of preparing the mushrooms, so you can start by cooking the rice and while you wait for that, you can prepare the rest of the ingredients.

– Once that’s been taken care of you, can now now move onto cutting the mushroom into half cm pieces, which you can then set aside.

– You can now cut the chicken thigh’s into 1 cm pieces and set aside.

Strips and ‘shooms

– Now it’s time to make the marinate for the dish. Take the Chinese rice wine, dark & light soy sauce, sesame oil, a teaspoon of salt , sugar and stir it into a mixing bowl, until the sugar has dissolved

Sometimes simple, is best

– Mix the marinate and the ingredients together and set aside.

Mixing it all around

– Heating up a pan to a high heat, caramelize the lap cheong until it starts to sizzle and you can start seeing them sweat a little, filling your kitchen with their moreish aroma.

So fatty, but so tasty…

– Once you’re done you can now set them aside, along with the juices from the pan.

Little chopped pieces of toasted goodness

– Don’t worry too much about cleaning the pan off, you can actually use the excess from the lap cheong to help flavour the chicken as you on a medium heat, cook the marinated chicken lightly through.

Ingredients: A little warmth and a bit of love

– Once this has been taken care off, add the lap cheong back into the pan, with a little corn starch mixed with cold water, to act as a thickening agent, mixing it around evenly before adding it into jasmine rice before it finishes cooking, so that the rice finishes off the cooking process, without becoming to soggy.

Pot of Chicken Rice goodness

– Let the rice finish cooking and voila, Chicken Rice with Chinese Sausage to share with family and friends.