Today, we are making soy sauce chicken. It will be hard to tell that you actually didn’t roast it. It looks and tastes like a roast chicken, so if you don’t have an oven, learn this rice cooker hack and impress your friends/family. It is a classic Cantonese dish. It is famous for its savory flavor and silky tender meat.

[U.S.A.] BUY MY WOK –
[REST OF WORLD] BUY MY WOK –

MY AMAZON INFLUENCER PAGE – (I share ingredients and recommended products there)
RECOMMENDED RICE COOKER:

PRINTABLE RECIPE –

INGREDIENTS
– 1 kg of a whole chicken
– 1/2 cup of light soy sauce [Amazon Link:
– 1 tbsp of Dark soy sauce [Amazon Link:
– 1/2 cup of Chinese rice wine [Amazon Link:
– 2 tbsp of Brown Sugar
– 1 Star anise [Amazon Link:
– 1 tsp of Sichuan peppercorn [optional] [Amazon Link:
– 1 small piece of cinnamon [Amazon Link:
– 2 pieces of bay leaves [Amazon Link:
– 1/2 of a medium size onion
– 1 inch of ginger
– 8 cloves of Garlic
– 2 pieces of Scallion

INSTRUCTION

– You want to use younger and smaller chicken for this recipe. The older the chicken is, the stronger the meat fiber will be. It is better to get one that is about 1 kg. If you don’t want to deal with a whole chicken, you can use chicken leg or chicken wing to make this recipe.

– Trim off the fat that is attached on the chicken. Just cut it into smaller bits and set it in the fridge.

– To the chicken, use a rope to tie the legs together. Make sure you leave a fair amount of rope at the end. Flip the chicken over. Bend the wing and tuck it behind the back. Set it aside.

– You will need about 1 inch of ginger. Cut it into smaller pieces. Smash them one by one. 8 cloves of garlic, slightly crush them as well. 1/2 of medium size onion, cut it into smaller pieces. Slight smash 2 pieces of spring onion to release the flavor and stuff them into the chicken.

– Let’s make the marinade. In a bowl, add in 1/2 cup of light soy sauce, 1 tbsp of dark soy sauce, 1/2 cup of rice wine, 2 tbsp of brown sugar, 1 star anise, 1 small piece of cinnamon, 2 pieces of bay leaves and 1 tsp of Sichuan peppercorn. Dump in the aromatics that we prepared before. Stir to dissolve the sugar.

– Put the chicken and the marinade into a sealable bag. Push out all the air and seal the bag. Let this sit in the fridge breast side down overnight

– Next day, pour everything out of the bag. Take the chicken out and save the liquid.

– Saute the chicken fat first until you get about 1.5 tbsp of chicken fat. If you don’t have chicken fat, it is completely ok to use regular cooking oil. We are going to brown the chicken. Once you think you got enough surfaces browned, pour in the sauce along with all the spices and 1-2 cups of water. Different rice cooker, the power is different, you will need to adjust the water amount. If you are not sure, use a small amount first and add more water if needed.

– Cover it, let it cook for 50 minutes to 1 hour. My chicken weights 1 kg, if your chicken is bigger you will need to cook it longer. During this time, you want to come back once every 15 minutes to give it a flip. That ensures an even color on the chicken surface. Like I mentioned before, if you think the sauce is evaporating too much ad it becomes too thick, you can add more water.

– After 1 hour of cooking, the sauce will be really thick and creamy. The chicken will have a dark brown color. Cantonese restaurants will hang this soy sauce chicken by the window. You may have seen this if you been to China town. If it is freshly made. You can see the sauce, juice dripping down. It is so delicious looking. You can serve it whole if you prefer this way because it looks prettier. Or you can chop it up like what local people would do even though it is a bit annoying to eat with bones.

– We usually serve this with white rice and some baby bok choy to balance the flavor. I don’t have bok choy today so I blanched some lettuce. There will be 1/3 cups of sauce left in the rice cooker. Drain the spices. It is very salty, so I will dilute it with some water and taste it to make sure it’s good. Pour the sauce over the chicken. Enjoy!

My other rice cooker hacks recipes:

Chinese Braised Pork Belly dong po rou Recipe [东坡肉]:
Easiest Homemade Cornbread Recipe:
Chocolate cake in a rice cooker: 0