Jazz up your Thai food court Khao Man Gai with Chinese ginger scallion oil!

[Jingthing]

For those of you familiar with the Chinese comfort food of chopped boiled Chinese chicken served with ginger scallion oil then you know how delicious that is (and how hard to find in Thailand)!

Well the other day I found a local Chinese place that does Chinese boiled chicken but it's not very good (they microwaved it the first time) and they don't always have ginger scallion oil (sometimes only garlic oil) and either way SHOCKINGLY too salty. What I like about that place is they've got good Chinese greens, like gai lan.

ANYWAY, thinking creatively, I've come up with a way to get an approximation of the Chinese experience at Thai FOOD COURTS. I tried it today and it's worth doing.

FIRST step, you've got to make your own ginger scallion oil.

But it's easy, fun, only uses a few ingredients.

Use this recipe:

http://chinesefood.about.com/od/sauces/r/ginger-oil.htm

Now I used much more ginger and 25 percent less salt.

Even then it was too salty so next time I will cut the salt more.

Also on the oil, I use the oil to cook it but I drain most of it for serving it (calories).

The tricky thing about the recipe is heating the oil. Do not boil the oil! If it smokes you've made it too hot. If the ingredients don't SIZZLE when you pour on the oil, it ain't hot enough.

So now you've got your ginger scallion oil.

Pack it up in some plastic thing and off to the food court!

At the food court order the following:

LARGE plate of sliced chicken from the Khao Man Gai counter (no rice). Most food courts offer this option with no rice. Take their chili sauce and soup, why not.

Plain white rice from another counter.

The reason not to purchase a plate of fatty rice is because the idea here is to simulate a different dish ... NOT Khao Man Gai.

Yes I know Thai Khao Man Gai is the Thai version of Chinese Hainanese chicken, but ... whatever.

Buy some stir fried GREENS from another counter. Whatever is available, whatever you like. Sure it will be Thai style cooked greens, but still this makes a better meal the chicken, rice, oil, and greens.

Too much trouble? Up to you.

Edited March 13, 2014 by Jingthing