Grilled Vietnamese-Style Chicken With Cucumber & Carrot Vinaigrette

I'd been thinking buying a grill pan for sometime now but the problem I'm facing was there's no Round Grill Pan available at the frequent shops and malls I went to. Most of shapes available were Square and Oval... but my cooking hobs are round! It's quite frustrated for me when I saw the 3 shapes in their brochures and they said straight to my face,"If there's none at the display counter, it means we don't have in this outlet. It's the HQ who dispatched the items to us. We don't keep stock such items." Come on... if you don't have THE item I wanted, please indicated in your brochure which outlets the products were available!

I hate to travel 369 kms to IKEA just to get what I want :'-( When are you coming to my area? Sigh... I had to settle for the oven grill... the ole faithful. Well, I knew few tricks to achieve what I want for this recipe but I'm too lazy... actually too tired from the coughings and sore throat problems I had on and off lately. I had to force myself to swallow the %$@# anti-biotics because I don't want to spread it to my family :-(

Luckily, that didn't deterred me from having a hearty meal :-P Actually, I'm trying to clear my refrigerator as much as possible to give her a thorough clean up and rearrange the compartments. I found an edible Double cream which later on I used for Vanilla Ice cream. There were 1/2 box of Low-fat Coconut Milk, 4 chicken thighs, some Kyuri (Japanese Cucumber) and topped it up with other ingredients, I decided to cook the chicken thighs for lunch.

Grilled Vietnamese-Style Chicken with Cucumber and Carrot Vinaigrette

Serves 2

350g - 500 g Chicken thighs/Chicken breasts - skin-on and deboned

For Marinate (to be blended into smooth paste):

2 cloves Garlic-roughly chopped

2 nos Small Red Onion (Asian Shallots*)

½ Tbl Fresh Ginger

60 ml Fresh Coconut Milk or Low-Fat Coconut Milk

2 Tbl Rice Vinegar/Glutinous Rice Vinegar

2 Tbl Fish Sauce

1 Tbl Soy Sauce

1 Tbl Brown Sugar

Cucumber & Carrot Vinaigrette Mix:

2 nos Japanese Cucumbers (Kyuri)

1 nos Carrrot (medium size)

1 ½ Tbl Rice Vinegar/Glutinous Rice vinegar

2 Tbl Peanut Oil or any oil that's light in flavour

1 Tbl Brown Sugar

1 tsp Salt

Method:

1. Wash and pat dry the chicken thoroughly. Place chicken in a ceramic bowl or any non-reactive containers, large enough for the chicken to marinate. Add in the marinade paste, stir to coat evenly and cover (since I used chicken thighs, I made some incisions to let the marinate permeates deeper). Let it sit for at least 15 - 20 minutes at room temperature or at least 3-5 hours for the best flavors in the refrigerator. I left it overnight until needed to have deeper and rich flavor.

2. For the vegetable vinaigrette; Peel the cucumbers and carrot into thin, long strips. In a bowl, whisk the rice vinegar, sugar, salt and oil. Add the peeled vegetables, toss to mix and refrigerate until serving. (I prefer to make salad closer to the end of cooking time to avoid the vegetables become watery and limp).

3. Set the grill in the oven to 220ºC (with 2 upper heaters on or the equivalent in the model you have but you can use grill pan, gas grill, charcoal grill or non-stick electric grill). Lightly oil the rack. Remove chicken from the marinate, shake of the excess. Place the chicken, skin side up (or down if you're using a pan grill) and grill until browned, about 7-8 minutes. Turn and grill the other side until browned for 5-7 minutes. Move the chicken away from the direct heat (turn off the upper heaters but maintain the temperature and place it in the middle rack in the oven). Continue to cook the chicken thoroughly for about 7-10 minutes or until the meat turned opaque.

4. Serve the grilled chicken with the cucumber vinagrette and rice.

Note: The above cooking times were based on the size of chicken cuts I bought. Depends on the size of chicken cuts, cooking time may varied. Please adjust accordingly to your grill also. If you're using pan grill, the browning is faster because of the direct contact with the pan. Make sure it's on medium heat and cook the chicken cuts until done. I'm thinking of getting one of this pan grill for a change-thanks Jamie :-)

*Small Red Onions (aka Asian Shallots): Small reddish purple onions, commonly used in Asian cookery.

These grow in bulbs, like garlic, and are sold in segments that look like large cloves of garlic. They have a concentrated flavour and are easy to slice and grind. You can substitute with your local shallots if you can't find it.

Enjoy!

Grilled Stuffed Mini Portobellas With Sake

It's mushrooms again! I know some people said mushrooms are boring besides in soup, salad, stew or stir-fry with other vegetables. I don't find them boring! They are so delicious, versatile and able to absorb wonderful juices and gravy that you threw them into. Simple as that! These mushrooms are big brother to little brown mushrooms. When grilled it has 'meaty texture - a welcome 'vegetarian  meat' by vegetarians and are great for baking, oven roasted and sauté.

Prepared stuffed mushrooms, ready for grilling and below, the mushrooms waiting to be tuck away in tummy!

Grilled Stuffed Mini Portobellas With Sake

6 pcs Mini Portobella Mushrooms

100 g Minced Beef - enough to stuff the mushroom caps

1/2 pc Carrrot - julienne

Few Sprigs of Italian Parsley - chopped finely

1 nos medium size Big Onion - chopped finely

20 - 40 ml Sake (more if you like)

L & P Worcestershire Sauce to taste

Salt & Pepper to taste

1 clove garlic - minced finely (optional)

Olive oil for frying

Good melting cheese of your choice - Enough cheese to cover the mushrooms

(I used grated hard Mozzarella... that's what was left in fridge :-D )

1. Remove the grits and clean the mushrooms. Cut or separate the stem from the caps. You can chopped the stem and mix in the stuffing as well if you want. ( I normally cut off any bruised and hard part of the stem. Chopped it up and mix into the mushroom stuffing).

2. Heat your oven to Grill Mode about 200 ºC using the upper heat (that will be about 20-25 minutes depends on the model of your oven).

3. Mix the minced meat with carrot, Italian Flat Parsley and onion. Give it a good stir until the minced meat mixed thoroughly with the spices and herbs. Add in salt, sake, Worcestershire Sauce and pepper to taste. ( I mixed some freshly grounded Szechuan pepper with the black pepper. I love the lemony hint and tingly numbness sensation these berries gave to your palate. It's frequently used in meat dishes in Chinese culinary - of course, the most in Szechuan cuisine.)

3.Heat some olive oil and fry the chopped garlic and onions;when the garlic and onions are fragrant, add the minced meat mixture and fry until just cook. Dish it out and set aside. Let the mixture cools a bit before stuffing the mushrooms.

4. Take a mushroom cap and spoon about 1 tablespoon of cooked meat mixture. Form it nicely so that the mixture not overflowing the caps. Sprinkle on top your favourite cheese. You can add some chopped parlesy or grinded fresh black pepper on top. Complete the rest of the mushroom caps.

Arrange them nicely on a tray/deep dish and drizzle some olive oil over the batch. Now, it's ready for the grill!

Note: Sometimes, the mushrooms grey/black 'gills' of portobellas (and some other types of button mushrooms) are removed if you want a nice and not blackish juice mingled into some white sauce/gravy. Use a spoon and scrap out the black gills of mushroom before the stuffings.

5. When the oven reached the required temperature, put in the oven and grill for 15 -  20 minutes or until the mushrooms caps wilted and cheese slightly browned. Depends on the size of the portobellas it may require less or more time to cook. So, you may need to watch out when the dish is grilling...

6. Serve as appetiser or side dish.

Enjoy!

Note: The longer you cook you cook the portobellas/ portobellos, the 'firmer texture'  the mushroom gets.