This week is all about birds, mainly turkeys but we’re going to head to the Philippines to try out one of their main specialty dishes: Adobo Chicken! Since we have several friends with Filipino heritage, we thought it would be special to have one of them share a favorite dish. The following family recipe was handed down to Poetry of Living contributor Joanna Shaw. Her mother has been making Adobo Chicken for as long as she can remember. It’s fairly simple as far as ingredients go — but very flavorful! One interesting thing about this dish is that it can be made a number of different ways. (Joanna’s mother is Filipino, from Spanish descent, so perhaps this version is a bit different).
This is also a special week to be thankful for what we all have and for family most especially. There are many Filipinos that could use extra help right now after the recent devastation from Typhoon Haiyan. We’ve included some links to donate at the end of this post.
Ingredients:
1 Whole Chicken – Cut in pieces (3 – 4 lbs.)
1 ½ – 2 Cups White Vinegar (depending on size of Chicken)
¾ – 1 Cup of Soy Sauce
6 – 8 Cloves of Garlic – chopped (again, depends on size of bird)
1 – 2 TBSP of Vegetable Oil (for frying)
Directions:
Put Chicken in pot w/ vinegar and chopped garlic and bring to a boil. Lower heat to simmer and add Soy Sauce. Let all ingredients simmer for 30 minutes and then remove pot from heat completely. Let the Chicken sit in pot with lid on for approximately 3 to 4 hours off the heat. Put back on heat on simmer and bring back to a low boil. In a different pan, preferably a deep fry pan or wok, add enough oil to cover the bottom. Meanwhile, leave pot w/ sauce on simmer with lid remove and transfer the chicken into the fry pan to ‘brown’. Put Chicken back into simmer sauce and leave lid off. Cook for another 10 – 15 more minutes. Serve over rice.
For a morning treat, you can serve remaining chicken w/ Rice and Egg heated in a fry pan. The longer the chicken is in the sauce, the tastier it becomes.
This is Joanna’s version of the recipe. She mentioned that her “Nana” made it but added whole peppercorn, which is something another Filipino friend does when making it for her family. Either way, this is quite delicious!
For donations to aid the victims of Typhoon Haiyan, please consider visiting the following organizations:
Definitely going to give this a try Kelly, thx.