Chicken Teriyaki

I’m not proud of this one, and I hesitate to post it, but it kinda didn’t suck and I could see myself making it again under similar circumstances.

So I’ve got two chicken breasts in the fridge and they either gotta get cooked or tossed.  It’s 9 pm and I’m hungry and my brain’s got no room for thinking.  So I slice the chicken thin, throw it in a non-stick soup pot, not yet on the stove (maybe I’ll end up poaching the chicken?) and then what?

Forget poached chicken (thankfully). I figure I’ve got some salty asian condiments that never go bad.  The chicken goes on the heat, some dark soy sauce gets poured in, a little miso paste, some chili-garlic sauce, and a splash of sesame oil.  Things cook and I figure, what the hell, let’s add a little honey…

Calorie Estimate: 900

Ingredients

• 1 lb. chicken breasts, sliced thin
• a few tablespoons of soy sauce
• 1 or so tablespoons of chili-garlic sauce (Sriracha brand)
• a dab of miso paste
• a splash of sesame oil (1/2 T maybe)
• 1-1.5 T honey

Preparation

1. Slice the chicken.  Throw all the ingredients (except the honey) into a nonstick pan of some sort, adding amounts until things look about right.
2. Cook over high heat until the chicken is cooked but still tender, a few minutes.
3. Take the chicken out, leave the liquid in the pot. The chicken will already have a bit of flavor from the cooking liquids.
4. Add some honey t0 the liquid in the pot and reduce into a sauce, maybe adding a pinch of corn starch if you need it.
5. Pour over the chicken, feel shame, then enjoy, maybe over some rice.

Done like above, things come out as salty and strongly flavored as at a Seattle-teriyaki joint, but not so sickly sweet.  I put in enough honey so that it’s there, but not the dominant flavor.

Asian chicken soup

Estimated calories for my serving: 950

Ingredients

• 1 chicken breast, cubed
• wedge of cabbage, sliced into ribbons
• rice noodles (or spaghetti etc)
• 6 cups water
• fish sauce
• hot pepper or hot sauce
• soy sauce
• miso paste
• lime juice, thai basil, and bean sprouts

Preparation

1. Add 6 cups of water to a soup pot, bring to a boil.
2. Poach cubed chicken.
3. Right after starting the chicken, add miso paste, until broth is suitably cloudy.  If you’re using an actual hot pepper, dice it and add it now.  Otherwise, add hot sauce with the fish sauce and soy sauce to taste (and adjust as needed later on).
4. Then, add in long rice noodles (or whatever equivalent you like/have), and cook them for the required amount of time.
5. A couple minutes before the noodles are done, add in the cabbage, stir and cook down.
6. Serve with a few squirts of lime juice and maybe some thai basil and bean sprouts if you’ve got them.