Lemon Chicken

Lemon Chicken , an original Chateau 1771 recipe by Vicky-Rose Pacheco

Here is another signature dish recently demonstrated by Chef Vicky of Chateau, Café Sentro, WineBar, SideBar and 1771 El Pueblo at Maya Kitchen. Lemon Chicken is crisp fried organic chicken leg nuggets coated with honey-lemon sauce . Yummy, I just love this tangy-sweetish Chicken dish.

This dish has two components: the chicken which will be marinated for at least 2 hours and the sauce which can be prepared in advance and parked in the freezer or refrigerator. On the day you want to serve this, deep fry the chicken and just thicken the sauce.

This Lemon Chicken always tastes better with garlic rice than with plain rice.

Here is the recipe:

14 (6.1k) pcs CHICKEN LEG, 350 to 400 grams per piece
Debone and set aside bones for chicken stock which is needed for the sauce.

MARINADE:
1 cup lime juice
25 grams garlic, peeled & chopped
25 grams ginger, peeled & chopped
1/3 tsp rock salt

1. Combine all ingredients in a blender and puree until smooth. Transfer to a bowl.

2. Dip each piece of leg in the marinade, turning it up and back, then transfer to a flat container with cover. Do this until all pieces have been coated with the marinade.

3. Pour the rest of the marinade in the container and cover it.
4. Leave in the refrigerator from 2 hours (minimum) up to 24 hours (maximum).

SAUCE:

Yield: 1 liter
1 cup +1 tsp lime juice
4 tbsps yamasa soy sauce
1 ½ cups white wine
8 cups chicken stock
1 ½ cups honey
tsp maya cornstarch, dissolved in water

1. Combine together in a small pot.

2. Bring to a boil then turn down heat to medium and cook until reduced into half.

3. Add the honey, mix well and continue reducing for 1 hour more until half.

4. At this point, you may transfer it to a container and let it cool. Or, you may continue by simmering further until you get a deep brown color.

5. Finishing touch: turn up heat to a medium then the cornstarch little by little while stirring continuously.

On the day of serving:

coconut or palm oil, for deep frying
MAYA All Purpose Flour for dredging

1. Prepare a pot of hot oil for deep-frying.

2. Dredge each piece of marinated chicken leg lightly with flour.

3. Deep fry the chicken pieces one by one until light brown, setting the fried pieces on a rack.

4. Cut up each chicken leg into 8 even pieces, like small nuggets.

5. Deep-fry the small pieces until crisp and golden brown.

6. Place the sauce in a pan and heat up. The consistency of the sauce should be like honey. Taste if the sauce has that sweet-sour balance.

7. On low fire, add the fried pieces to the sauce and coat evenly by shaking the pan and using a saute spoon to move about the pieces, taking care not to burn the sauce. If the sauce is too runny, it will coat the pieces but the flavor will be light. If the sauce is too thick, it might become too sweet.

8. Serve with garlic rice.

For more information, log on to www.themayakitchen.com or e-mail [email protected].