Images Foil-Baked Herbal Chicken

Oh noooOoo.. there goes my decade-old crockpot! It tore at the rim just as I placed the heavy clay pot onto the heating base *sad*.

I was going to slow cook a herbal chicken dish for dinner but ended up using the oven, going the foil-wrap way. The meal turned out oh-so-yummy but then again, my lack of fussiness is surely a bane to food critiquing and any real assessment taste-wise. I have the genes of a regular mom (although I'm not one myself) when it comes to food and wastage.

This is my version of Foil-Baked Herbal Chicken. It's simple to prepare - just involves throwing everything together and leaving it to cook. The end result is tender chicken in a rich flavoured sweetish soup gravy.

Foil-Baked Herbal Chicken

Ingredients:
- 4 chicken thigh pieces
- 2 large red dates (seeded and halved)
- 2 medium onions (quartered)
- A handful of solomon seal rhizome (yu zhu, pre-soaked an hour)
- A handful of fresh coriander (roughly cut)
- 1 tbsp oyster sauce stirred in 1-1½ cup water (largely depends on baking tray size)
- Pinch of salt and pepper

How-to:
1. Rub a little salt and pepper on the chicken pieces.

2. Line the inside of the baking dish with foil. Spread chicken pieces, dates, onions, yu zhu on top. Pour diluted oyster sauce in at the sides (Add more water/sauce if you want more gravy).

3. Cover the top of the tray with foil, make it air-tight (to steam the chicken). Bake at 180C in a pre-heated oven for just about an hour. Leave to rest for another 15 minutes before opening the cover (Be careful - hot steam will gush out.)

4. Garnish with coriander and serve.

Images The Lunar New Year "Happiness" Drink

I love Chinese New Year. It is a time which inspires us to cook with "auspicious meaning" in mind, usually involving food with similar sounding words that convey good wishes or messages.

For instance, the word Fatt Choy widely meaning 'prosperity wish' in Cantonese closely resembles the word Black Moss (also Fatt Choy) in the same language. For this reason, many Chinese include Fatt Choy into their New Year menu.

In our family, it is no different. On the first day of Chinese new Year, Tua Soh (eldest sister-in-law) prepares the "Happiness Drink" for our household. It is a sweet concoction of typical auspicious Chinese ingredients like the Pak Hup which is noted for unity, lotus seeds for fruitfulness, gingko nuts for wealth and so forth. The sweetness of the drink makes it a pleasant experience that keeps us happy. This is the message that it carries.

I share the recipe below, courtesy of Tua Soh. There are no quantifiable measurements for this recipe. You're free to follow your heart ~ the key is simply that it must be sweet and every cup served should contain at least one of each ingredient.

Happiness Drink

Ingredients:
- Dried Lotus Seeds
- Gingko Nuts
- Pak Hup (Dried Magnolia Petals)

- Honey Dates

- Dried Longans
- Dried Red Dates (Cut in half and seeded)
- Cane sugar (To taste)

How-to:
1. Boil dried lotus seeds, gingko nuts and pak hup together until tender. Then, drain away the water. We don't use this water because it is bitter. Leave aside.

2. Boil honey dates in sugared water, drain and leave aside.

3. To make the longan soup, boil dried longans with water (enough to serve the number of people required) for 3-4 minutes in a large pot. Add red dates and cane sugar. This will be the base of the drink because of the fragrant smell.

4. To serve, combine longan soup with ingredients from 1. and 2.

Pot of fragrant goodness

Yummy Honey Dates

I hope you enjoy this drink as much as I do.