Coca Cola Chicken

I am SO behind on visiting my favorite blogs that I am sure you all think something's happened to me. I assure you I am still around. But I've been so busy that sometimes I feel like my head is spinning! I just started visiting blogs over the weekend and I still haven't covered all of them! My Google Reader is overflowing, and I can't believe how many yummy recipes I have missed out on seeing!

Well, visiting the remaining blogs is going to have to wait two more days, because we are heading to the beach for a couple of days. We leave Monday morning and we're back Tuesday evening. Not a long trip, and we do have a work thing there on Monday evening, but at least it's by the beach! I am so looking forward to it! I can't believe how much luggage we have for just ONE night away from home, but I guess that's inevitable with a toddler to pack for! And I still think there's something I've forgotten to pack... Sigh!

Before I leave, I want to share this recipe that I made last week. It is one I've made before, but this was the first time I managed to get some (not-so-great) pictures! This tastes really yummy, and reminds me so much of the kind of food we used to eat when we lived in Singapore!

For this recipe, I use Coca Cola, and I honestly don't  know if Pepsi would work the same. But I really don't think the 'diet' variants would work at all.

Coca Cola Chicken
Ingredients
1/2 kg chicken pieces (around 1 pound)
300ml Coca Cola
2 tbsp ketchup
1 tbsp lemon juice
4 tbsp soy sauce

1 tbsp vegetable oil

1 tbsp julienned ginger

1 tbsp chopped garlic

1-4 dried red chillies (I used 4)

1 tbsp sesame oil

Method

1. In a large bowl, marinate the chicken pieces with the coca cola, ketchup, lemon juice and soy sauce for at least an hour.
2. In a large saucepan/wok, heat the vegetable oil, and stir fry the ginger and garlic until the garlic just softens.
3. Remove the chicken from the marinade, and stir fry the pieces of chicken along with the ginger and garlic until lightly browned.
4. Pour in the marinade, add the red chillies and cover the wok. Cook until the chicken is tender.
5. Cook on a high flame until the juices reduce to form a thick, sticky sauce. If you want more sauce, don't let it reduce, but just thicken it by adding one tablespoon of cornflour mixed with some water.
5. Taste the sauce, and add more soy sauce if more salt is needed. I even added a wee bit of brown sugar because I thought it needed to be a little sweeter(!!!).
6. Stir in the sesame oil, and serve with steamed rice and vegetables.

I have made this with boneless thigh pieces too. For that recipe, I brown the pieces slightly, remove them from the wok, add the sauce & cook it down until thick. Then I add in the chicken pieces and cook until the pieces are tender. The original is tastier because we all know how much of the flavor is in the bones!

I hope you enjoy this recipe! It is sticky, sweet, salty, spicy and fragrant. I really love it. I must admit that my husband is not a very big fan of this recipe. He finds it too sweet, but my daughter and I gladly ate up every single bit, and there were no leftovers.

We're off to the beach now! See you later this week! :)

Thanks to all those who entered the giveaway. I will draw the names when I get back and will announce the results on Wednesday! I can't wait to see which two lucky commenters won a copy of Jill Colonna's Mad about Macarons!