Spicy Korean Chicken (닭볶음)

★★This recipe is also great with pork!★★ 

This is one of my favorites to cook and one of my husband’s favorites to eat!  Like most of my Korean recipes, I discovered how to make them on accident.  This recipe evolved from non-spicy one I had learned called “Broiled Chicken” (닭구이) into what it is today!  Yay!  It begins very similarly to how I started off for General Tso’s Chicken.

What I Use:
↕ Boneless, Skinless Chicken Breast (I generally cook a pound or more–I like to prepare extra for other days)
↕ Soy Sauce
↕ Sesame Oil
↕ Korean Fermented Red Chili Pepper Paste (“Goch’ujang”)
↕ Sugar
↕ Toasted Sesame Seeds
↕ Garlic (I use the minced garlic you can buy in stores)
↕ Scallions (Long Green Onions)
↕ Yellow Onion
↕ Veggies to Taste! (Completely optional, but it can add some really great additional flavor.  Slices of zucchini are great for this, and you also often see it prepared with carrots.)

Step 1:
Cut the chicken into thin slices and score.  Add to a container (I like to use our extra sherbet bins!).  I always add the soy sauce first so that I can fairly just the amount I am using.  I pour in enough so that after mixing it in with the chicken, there is still a thin layer left on the bottom because this will get absorbed by the red pepper paste and other items.

Step 2:
Add the sesame oil, garlic, sugar and sesame seeds.  For the sesame oil, I pour in what I feel is enough to coat each piece.  Too much sesame oil will give it a stronger sesame taste, so it does not require a whole lot.  I add enough garlic so that you can see pieces of it here and there.  It usually ends up being just under a spoonful.  For the sugar, it’s roughly 3 spoonfuls for the pound.  This is also to taste and to diet.  It adds a great sweetness to the dish that truly compliments the spiciness of it (which, made this way, is not overly spicy).  Sesame seeds are basically whatever you feel looks good.  ^.~

Step 3:
Time to add some spice!  I always start out with a rounded spoonful of the spicy chili paste (goch’ujang).  After I mix it in, I look to see if I can see a hint of red or if it is still more brown.  Once I see a hint of the red color, I know we are good to go!

Step 4:
Here, you can see that I have cut up and added the onions (both kinds).  You can also add the veggies at this time (I did not use any this time around).  Mix it all together, and you can more easily gauge whether or not you have too little or too much chili pepper paste in there.  In the picture of everything mixed up, you can see that there is a hint of red on the yellow onions in particular–perfect!

Step 5:
Meat needs time to soak in the flavor.  I like to let this sit covered in the fridge for at least 30 minutes before cooking.  You can let it sit for 30 minutes, one day…either way, you’ll get a great tasting dish!

 
Step 6:
Cook!  (Shown in the back with Kimch’i Beansprout Soup in the front)  I like to use a medium heat and always use a nonstick pan, letting it heat before I put the chicken on it.  Some people say never heat a pan without putting something in it first, but I don’t bother too much with that.  It doesn’t take too long to cook because the pieces are thin and scored.  If in doubt, just check the thickest piece to see.  I usually make sure that I only cook what covers the bottom of the pan, not piling it up a whole lot.  I apparently forgot to take a picture of the finished product up close, so sorry about that!

General Tso’s Chicken-First Try

I tried making General Tso’s Chicken last night using a sauce I had picked up at Le Gourmet Chef at the Mall of America.  We had sampled it there with pretzels and decided to pick up a bottle to try it at home!  This is a super simple recipe that can easily be jazzed up in a variety of ways.

This is how I tried preparing it:

I began with gathering the sauces and things of the like I thought I’d use.  Here, I have sesame oil, General Tso’s sauce, garlic and sugar.  I also took out an onion and green bell pepper.

I cut the boneless-skinless chicken breast into thin slices and scored* each piece.  I then added some of the garlic** to take away the strong “chicken taste” my husband doesn’t like.  ^.~

I also added two spoonfuls of sugar for sweetness.  Doing this recipe again, I would either add more sugar or put in a little bit of honey for more flavor.

I then started adding the sauces. 

• For the General Tso’s sauce, I added enough so that after mixing it, there was still excess in the bottom.

• For the sesame oil (shown here), I added enough to “cover” the chicken, basically enough where I felt each piece was coated with enough for cooking.

• The Gen. Tso’s sauce has soy sauce in it, but after I mixed the sauce in there, it looked too pale to have had a relatively decent amount.  Thus, I added about a spoonful or a little less of soy sauce.  Repeating this recipe, I would probably add a little more than that.

Here it is all mixed up.

Then, it was time for the onions and bell peppers.  You can really add any vegetable you want, but for our purposes, we almost always use onions.  I would have loved to use a red or yellow pepper for added sweetness, but all I had at home was a green pepper, so I went with that.   

I mixed all of that together and let it sit in the fridge for about a half hour.***

Then, it was cooking time!  I always use a nonsitck pan, and the chicken already has sesame oil on it, so you do not need to put anything in the pan while it is heating.  Yes, people tell you you should, but I say rubbish to them.  On our electric stove, I set it to “5,” which is about the midpoint for heat.

And voila!  General Tso’s chicken! 

(Yes, we eat out of the pan to keep it hot when it’s just the two of us. XD)

*On Scoring: I think scoring is critical when preparing meat, personally.  It helps it to cook faster since the heat can penetrate inside more quickly, and it also helps to make the meat more tender and delicious.  My two cents, anyway.  ^.~

**On Garlic: When preparing meat in our house, garlic is a must-have.  I am very, very sensitive to the kind of garlic used a lot in Italian cooking and whatnot, but this garlic does not have the same kind of impact.  It really helps to take away the bland flavor of the meat you are cooking to help emphasize the ingredients you have mixed in.  My husband can always tell when I’ve forgotten to put it in.

***Letting it Sit: This is critical for maximizing the amount of flavor retained while cooking.  For chicken, I like to do at least a half-hour, and that usually does the trick.  Longer is often better, but not always critical.  For my beef recipes, I prefer to let those sit overnight to really soak it all in.  Every time I have cooked in a hurry and have not allowed it to sit, the flavor has been really weak.

What I would do differently: I would add something for a little added sweetness, such as a little honey or a little more sugar.  I would also add a little more soy sauce because it just didn’t have enough, in my opinion.  I might mix in a tiny bit of more spice for a little more kick, too. 

Overall, though, it was a good dish that I think everyone can enjoy.  I’m used to eating foods with really strong flavor profiles, and this was a little weaker.  I think that makes it more universally likeable than some of the other foods we eat.  ^^;;