Chinese white cut chicken (bái qie ji) is a classic New Year's dish and an everyday comfort item for most Chinese home cooks. It's just a poached chicken served with a scallion-ginger sauce. While it may seem plain and simple, it takes some practice to master the cooking method and produce a juicy and flavorful chicken.

Hungry Bear turned to a recipe from The Wisdom of the Chinese Kitchen for directions. The end result was a white cut chicken that was moist and delicious. I loved dipping the chicken into the scallion-ginger sauce and spooning the sauce over steamed rice. Who knew a poached chicken could be so good!?!

Update August 13, 2008: The first picture in this post won the DMBLGIT July 2008 aesthetics category! We are very psyched and honored to receive the recognition.

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Growing up in Allentown, PA, my family would take trips down to Washington, DC to visit my great aunt and uncle. As an active kid, I always dreaded going down to DC because I had to spend most of the time cooped up inside my great aunt and uncle's apartment. The highlights of the trips were the amazing home cooked Vietnamese meals prepared by my great aunt. Her roasted chicken (ga ro ti) and sticky rice were my favorite dishes.

It's been over two decades since I had ga ro ti. I never see it at restaurants (at least in San Francisco), as most Viet places serve grilled chicken (ga nuong) with five spice. So last week, I decided to make Vietnamese roasted chicken. I called up my parents to get advice. Unfortunately, neither of my parents make the dish and my great aunt passed away several years ago. My dad said, "marinate it in soy, fish sauce, garlic and a little sugar"...like every other Viet dish, not much help there. I was on my own with this one.

I remember my great aunt pan fried her chicken low and slow. I believe this "roasting" method was used because traditional ovens weren't available in Vietnam back in the day, unless you were wealthy. My great aunt's chicken had an extra crispy skin and the meat was shreddable by hand, almost like a confit. To get this texture, the chicken needs to be cooked longer than normal.

I tried the pan frying technique and produced a good ga ro ti, but it required a lot of time and flipping of the chicken (props to my great aunt!). I debated covering the chicken, but was afraid the skin would get soft from the moist heat. Next, I tried browning the chicken in an oven-proof skillet and then finishing it off in the oven. I liked this method best. It produced a nice crispy skin and I didn't have to stand by the stove top. If you are thinking, why don't you skip the pan frying and just roast it in the oven, then my answer is... I have more control over browning with a skillet and the brown bits in the pan can be de-glazed to make a flavorful dirty sticky rice with scallions.

Hungry Bear and I enjoyed the ga ro ti so much, we made it again for Sunday night dinner along with the dirty sticky rice, stir-fried hollow greens and a light carrot cake for dessert. The chicken had a nice salty, garlicky flavor with a crackling skin. I never eat all of my chicken skin. I usually try a little and then pass the rest to Jane, who likes everything full fat. But the skin on this roasted chicken was so good, I wasn't sharing it with anyone! The perfect complement to the chicken was the dirty sticky rice, which has scallions and all the wonderful flavors from the de-glazed frying pan!

My great aunt's ga ro ti will always be number one in my heart. I may not have re-created her roasted chicken exactly, but I got pretty damn close!

SNDsters: Jane, Mark, Hungry Bear, Chuck

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Sometimes the simplest food is the best food. It doesn't get any easier than fried eggs and shrimp (trung chien tom). Throughout my childhood, my mom made this dish, serving it with steamed rice. It was so simple, yet so satisfying.

This past Sunday night, I made fried eggs and shrimp for the SNDsters and Hungry Bear baked a carrot cake. We'll share the carrot cake recipe next time. In my family, we served trung chien tom on a bed of greens and tomatoes. Then we dunked it all in Vietnamese dipping sauce (nuoc cham) and ate it with jasmine rice. I'm not sure how normal it is to eat it this way, but it's ingrained in me and I'm sticking with it. Does anyone else eat it like this?

The meal has a nice combination of sweet, salty and slightly bitter from the watercress. The greens and tomatoes cut down the richness and makes it a little healthier. Fried eggs and shrimp is such a comforting Vietnamese dish for me. It's super easy to make and is absolutely delicious!

SNDsters: Jane, Mark, Hungry Bear, Chuck

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After Hungry Bear made her Hawaiian marinated chicken last week, we still had three pounds of unused chicken thighs. I needed to figure out what to make with them before they went into the freezer, where they would be forgotten. We are really bad with frozen meat and don't plan ahead enough to thaw it out.

I had a craving for green chili chicken stew, but couldn't find a recipe to my liking. Hungry Bear loves sweet potatoes, so I made braised chicken curry with yams, which is based on a Ming Tsai recipe. I've been tweaking this curry over the years. The dish calls for orange-flesh sweet potatoes, a.k.a. garnet yams.

The biggest changes to the original recipe are the omission of the banana and adjustments to the curry powder. I think there is enough sweetness from the yams, so there's no need for the banana. I've also adjusted the amount of chicken stock and added peas for some color.

The key ingredient is the curry powder. Ming recommends this Madras curry powder, but I'm not a fan of this brand or other brands found in most supermarkets. They're not bad, but I prefer a hot curry powder mix that we picked up at Bombay Bazar, a local Indian market. My issue with the Madras curry powder may also stem from the quantity used in Ming's recipe, 1/3 cup or 5 tablespoons. That's way too much. And it doesn't have any heat. Okay, my definition of heat is a little lot skewed.

The modified braised chicken curry recipe is finally dialed into our tastes. It's easy to make and it's one-pot cooking. There's a nice balance of heat and sweet from the yams and peas. Served over rice, it's a very filling and satisfying dish. If you leave the sweet potatoes a little firm, they'll retain their shape and the curry will look nice and pretty. On the flip side, if you cook the yams a little longer, they'll get mushy and thicken the sauce. Either way, it's a great curry to try out.

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After last month's declaration that my mom's spicy lemongrass chicken was the dish I would eat for the rest of my life if I had to choose one item, Hungry Bear was a little sad. I had told her previously that her Hawaiian marinated seared chicken was my favorite chicken dish. Doh, how do you choose between your mom's cooking and your girlfriend's? It's a no win situation.

Despite my faux pas, Hungry Bear still made her Hawaiian chicken this past week. We hadn't seen some SNDsters for awhile and had a midweek "Sunday night dinner." We served the chicken over rice with a side of stir-fried vegetables. For dessert, we made a fantastic blueberry kuchen.

The chicken is very flavorful and tender, because it's marinated overnight in a citrus marinade. The marinade is a blend of strong flavors, particularly the Chinese five spice, fresh mint and mustard. I think the best part is the sauce created by deglazing the frying pan with some reserved marinade. The sauce contains all the caramelized bits left in the pan, and it's wonderful on the chicken and rice.

We have prepared the chicken two other ways — pan seared then finished in the oven, and barbecued on the grill. Both methods worked out fine and I really liked grilling the chicken, but Hungry Bear determined the best approach is just to pan fry the chicken thighs until they are done. The benefit is extra caramelized bits for deglazing!

The chicken was absolutely delicious. I just want to state for the record that my mom's spicy lemongrass chicken is my favorite Vietnamese chicken and Hungry Bear's Hawaiian chicken is my favorite non-Vietnamese chicken dish. I hope this latest declaration makes everyone happy and keeps me out of potential trouble.

SNDsters: Howie, Mark, Jane, Hungry Bear, Chuck

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A Vietnamese kho is a savory-sweet dish simmered in a caramel-based sauce and is traditionally prepared in a clay pot. It's the ultimate comfort food for me. There are many variations of kho with different proteins used. My favorite kho is ga kho xa ot, which is chicken quickly braised with lemongrass and chili peppers.

Nothing beats my mom's ga kho xa ot! Whenever I visit my parents, it's the first thing my mom prepares for me. I don't ask for it. She just knows it's my favorite meal and I would be a little disappointed if she made anything else. Yes, my mom spoils me. I have no problem admitting it!

I love the dish for its simplicity and wonderful flavors. It has a great combination of salty and sweet from the fish sauce and caramel sauce. While the chicken simmers, the lovely aroma of lemongrass fills the kitchen. The spiciness from the chili peppers is critical and balances the sweetness of the dish.

The best part of the ga kho xa ot is the flavorful sauce that goes fantastically over rice with a few dashes of Crystal Extra Hot Hot Sauce. Give me a bowl of rice and mix in just ga kho sauce and I would be a happy camper. The sauce is that good!

In my family, we serve ga kho xa ot with a side of steamed vegetables, usually cabbage. This may sound bland, but once you dip the cabbage in the chicken sauce there's no need for any other seasoning.

Hungry Bear has asked, "If you had to choose one dish to eat for the rest of your life, what would it be?" Her choice is fried rice. I could never give her a definitive answer, because I like to eat everything... life is a big buffet for me. But I'm finally going on the record and stating that it would be my mom's ga kho xa ot!

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I wrote this article for another blog last year. I thought it would be interesting for anyone thinking about deep-frying a turkey. I made a few minor updates to the article. After this Thanksgiving, I'll post about our turkey day festivities.

Every Thanksgiving, we get together at Jane and Mark's place and cook a big feast. It's usually an East meets West affair, with a combination of traditional turkey day favorites along with a variety of Asian dishes. Over the years, we've had roasted turkeys the conventional way, brined and even a Peking turkey, which is a turkey prepared Peking duck style. Several years ago, we deep-fried a turkey and it was spectacular. Now it's our preferred turkey cooking method.

Most of us are dark meat people and think white meat is dry when roasted in the oven. The white meat of a deep-fried turkey is the juiciest white meat we've ever had, and it's not greasy at all. Even better, you don't have to slave over the oven for a couple of hours. It takes less than 50 minutes (3.5 minutes per pound) to fry a 14 lb turkey. There's no way we would go back to roasting a turkey in the oven again.

If you are apprehensive about deep-frying a turkey, it's most likely due to health concerns and/or the potential fire danger. Prior to having deep-fried turkey, I thought the meat would be on the greasy side, which is not the case at all. From an article previously on Epicurious...

Today, though everyone from Martha to Emeril has gotten in the act, fried turkey is still a foreign concept to many, who think of it as a comically large, batter-fried, dripping-with-grease bird. Yet nothing could be further from the truth. When dropped in a vat of boiling peanut oil, the turkey becomes a crispy amber beacon of juicy deliciousness — to put it in technical terms. "The hot oil has a flash-frying effect on the turkey, which seals the skin and all the moisture in it," says Aricka Westbrooks, owner of Jive Turkey, a fried turkey restaurant and distributor in Brooklyn, New York, of all places. Since the high temperature of the oil seals the skin, the result is moist, juicy meat with what Westbrooks describes as a velvety texture.

The high temperature keeps it from absorbing much oil — some studies claim a whole turkey absorbs less than a tablespoon. The key is to keep the oil above 340°F. According to the National Turkey Federation, a 5.9-ounce serving of fried turkey prepared with a dry rub has approximately 383 calories and 21 grams of fat. Compare that to roast turkey's 362 calories and 16 grams of fat. (Calories and fat grams of roast turkey vary according to preparation.)

High oil temperature is the key in preventing greasy turkey meat. Most recipes call for an oil temp of 350 degrees F. From an oil 101 article...

Maintain a frying temperature of 190 degrees C (375 degrees F). The batter-coated or breaded surface will quickly form a protective shield, preventing the oil from penetrating the cooled food and making it greasy. The food will cook by conduction or indirect heat.

If the oil is not hot enough, oil will reach the food before the coating cooks enough to form the protective layer. The result is greasy food. If the oil is too hot, the coating will burn from the direct heat of the oil before the food has had time to cook.

Safety is probably the biggest issue with deep-frying a turkey. Nobody wants to burn their house down. Deep-frying anything can be dangerous because of the bubbling vat of hot oil. It's even more hazardous when a big bird is involved. I'm sure you've seen videos of oil splattering over the stock pot and igniting. I won't deny it is dangerous to deep-fry a turkey, but if you take some safety precautions, you can minimize the danger.

I highly recommend reading and following these safety tips from UL.com. A few other tips to highlight are:

• Use a large stock pot - get the largest stock pot possible to prevent overflow of oil.
• Buy smaller turkeys - for first timers, smaller turkeys (10 - 11 lbs) are going to be easier to handle than larger birds. I would generally recommend 12 lb turkeys or smaller to avoid any oil overflow. Additionally, bigger turkeys don't fry as evenly, as the outside maybe overdone and the inside underdone. It's better to deep-fry two smaller birds, than risk the fire danger of frying a large bird.
• Submerge your bird - dunk your turkey in the pot filled with water and mark the water line to determine the appropriate amount of oil. Make sure you dry the turkey afterwards.

I've used a traditional propane turkey fryer, which consists of a large stainless steel pot and an outdoor gas-burner stove/stand, and an electric deep fryer. The oil heats up faster using the gas-burner type. Additionally, you'll be able to fry, boil or steam larger amounts of food using the gas-burner models, but the electric fryers are safer because there's no open flame to ignite the oil.

I've made delicious deep-fried turkey using both an electric deep fryer and a gas-burner model. But I prefer the electric deep fryer for safety reasons, and an adjustable thermostat makes it easer to maintain oil temperature. Electric deep fryers are more expensive, but worth the extra money for the safety.

When performed with care, deep-frying a turkey can be safe and will produce the best turkey you'll ever have. Give it a try this year and save some time in the kitchen. You'll love deep-fried turkey.

Deep-Fried Turkey Resources

• Cooking Tips: Deep-Fried Turkey (Barbecues Galore)
• Southern Fried Turkey Instructions (Don Drane)
• A Deep Fried Delicacy: How to & Rubs (Eatturkey.com)
• Paula Deen Recipe (Food Network)
• Oil 101 (Whole Harvest)
• Deep-Fried Turkey Videos (YouTube)
• Deep Fryer Safety Tips (UL.com)

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This past Sunday, Hungry Bear and I had friends over for Sunday Nite Dinner. We wanted to make a simple, one-pot cooking dish. Hungry Bear suggested one of her favorite meals, Thai green curry with chicken. It's been awhile since we made green curry, so it sounded good.

Over the years, we have experimented with various green curry recipes, but we haven't been completely satisfied with any of them, particularly the green curry paste. This time around, we tried a curry recipe by Kasma Loha-unchit, who teaches Thai cooking classes in the Bay Area. We used Kasma's recipe for the green curry paste and followed most of the directions from her easy green curry with pork recipe.

Obviously, we substituted chicken for the pork, but we also made a few other changes to the recipe. The modifications were...

1. Increased the amount of meat - we used 2 lbs of skinless chicken thighs with bones, instead of 1 lb. Our friends are big carnivores, so this step is always necessary.
2. Added chicken stock - the stock is used for two reasons. First, it lightens up the coconut milk curry. But more importantly, the stock is used to braise the chicken thighs. I'm a big fan of braised meat, especially when the meat falls off the bone. We followed Kasma's directions to prepare the coconut milk and paste mixture, then added the chicken thighs and enough stock to almost cover the chicken (approximately 1 cup).
3. Increased the cooking/braising time - we simmered the chicken in the coconut, curry paste and chicken stock for approximately an hour, until the chicken meat almost fell off the bone.
4. Added more ingredients - we also added straw mushrooms, bamboo shoots and sweet petite peas. The extra ingredients were added to the pot with the eggplant.

The end result was delicious green curry with braised chicken server over jasmine rice. Everyone had at least two servings! We were extremely happy with the curry paste recipe and our green curry tasted very authentic. The braised chicken was fork tender and is much superior to the pieces of chicken used in most recipes. The cooking time is longer to braise the chicken thighs, but it's definitely worth the wait. We did save some time by not having to cut pieces of chicken.

For dessert, Hungry Bear and I made thick and chewy chocolate chunk cookies and had our friends make their own ice cream sandwiches with vanilla and chocolate ice cream. It was quite decadent. I felt like a glutton, but I loved every bite of my ice cream sammy. I plan on writing a follow-up post to discuss the dessert in the full detail it deserves.

Dinner was excellent and it was fun hanging out with our friends. Next time, to make the curry more flavorful, we will marinate the chicken thighs in some green curry paste and a little fish sauce. Additionally, I want to brown the chicken prior to adding it to the braising liquid. I can almost taste it now, and can't wait to make green curry with braised chicken again!

SNDsters: Jane, Mark, Howie, Hungry Bear, Chuck

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Sunday Nite Dinner (SND) was at Jane and Mark's place this past week. Jane texted me Sunday morning and asked if we wanted to have SND at her place. This is usually how SND happens. Typically, someone wants to cook dinner and calls around to see who is available to come over.

Jane was planning on making Peruvian roast chicken and guacamole. I told her Hungry Bear and I would go to the store and pick up vegetables and make a veggie dish and surprise, surprise -- a chocolate dessert.

So this week's SND menu was created...

• Fresh Guacamole and Chips
• Peruvian Roast Chicken with Aji Verde Sauce
• Stir Fried Broccolini with Olive Oil and Garlic
• Chocolate Pudding Cake topped with Dr. Bob's Tahitian Vanilla Ice Cream

When Hungry Bear and I arrived at Jane and Mark's place, they were in the process of prepping the chicken. The recipe for Peruvian chicken with aji verde can be found in the Food Network Kitchens Cookbook. The recipe requires one whole head of garlic. Thankfully, Mark is the ultimate prep chef and his garlic mincing skills have become legendary.

The chicken is stuffed with garlic and seasoned with salt and pepper. A paste consisting of garlic, cumin, red wine vinegar, soy sauce, sugar and vegetable oil is applied to the chicken before it goes into the rotisserie oven. The chicken can also be roasted in a regular oven, but we prefer it rotisserie style.

As we waited the hour and twenty five minutes for the chicken to roast, we made fresh guacamole to snack on. I didn't follow a recipe, but this guacamole recipe is very similar in preparation. The guac and chips were delicious and we tried not to overeat. I think everyone was successful except for me. I have no self control when it comes to food. If it's in front of me, I'll eat it.

For the vegetable dish, Hungry Bear made broccolini in her signature style, which is how she prepares most of her vegetables... stir-fried in olive oil with garlic and salt. It's a very simple method, which is quick, healthy and very good. We like to let vegetables stand on their own, instead of masking them with a heavy sauce.

The best part of the Peruvian chicken is the aji verde sauce that goes on top of it. Jane made the aji verde, which is a quick mix of cilantro, Cotija cheese, jalapenos, garlic, red wine vinegar, extra virgin olive oil, water and kosher salt. There's no cooking required, just a quick puree in a blender is required.

The Peruvian roast chicken came out of the rotisserie extra moist, even the white meat. The chicken with aji verde on top is simply amazing. I love pouring the aji verde on everything... chicken, rice and broccolini!

We ended SND with chocolate pudding cake with chocolate chunks. It's a nice treat to get an extra hit of chocolate goodness from the melted bittersweet chunk.  The pudding cake was warm, chocolaty and gooey, but it was missing its usual crispy, chewy top layer. It was probably due to the variance of oven temps between my oven and Jane's... now we know.

Sunday Nite Dinner was very satisfying. Since there were only four of us, it was a pretty low key SND, but it also means more food for us and leftovers for Jane and Mark!

SNDsters: Mark, Jane, Hungry Bear, Chuck

Updated January 30th, 2008: Added a link to the chocolate pudding cake recipe.

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