Another rice porridge recipe - with chicken

I made rice porridge (jook) quite often lately, I guess due to the colder weather, plus my tired appetite after looong *rough* days at work (that's another whole topic in itself which I may need a vent blog to write about, but I'll keep this blog strictly to food :)

I was blogging about plain jook with salted eggs before. Here's another jook recipe, I like this jook more because it is more tasty but it takes a teeny tiny more work since you'll need to prep the meat.

Here's the steps:

+ 1 cup of rice, washed and drained (I add about 1/3 tsp of olive oil and mix well into the damp rice)
+ Boil a pot of water ( ~ 1.5-2 quarts)
+ Add 1 can of chicken broth and let boil with the water.
+ Add rice, reduce heat to medium-to-low and stir every once in a while to avoid boil over.
+ Scoop off the foam occasionally
+ Add additional water as needed (depends on how thick you want your jook, I usually like my less thick and more silky, so I just add more water and cook longer)
+ Add 2/3 tsp salt, or to taste.
+ Let simmer for 45 min to 1 hr

While letting jook simmer on the stove, prep the chicken and ginger as following:



+ 1 chicken breast, boneless skinless, cut into thin slices, put in a large bowl
+ Add the following ingredients, and mix them all well with the chicken pieces
1 tsp of cornstarch (can be skipped if you don't have it)
1/2 tsp of salt
Ground black pepper to your liking (lots of pepper in mine - I love that challenging hot AND spicy feeling)
A small dab of sugar (optional)
+ Cut ginger into thin threads as following:

Add the chicken and ginger into your pot of jook about 1/2 hr before turning off heat and serve hot.

You may cook the chicken in your jook longer, it may make the chicken overcook and drier (that's why I add cornstarch to help moist the meat).



Serve very hot, add ground pepper and chopped green onion as desired.

porridge (jook) and salted egg

I always love porridge as a "cleansing" meal. I remember my Mom used to make the best porridge (jook) for me when I was sick. Sometimes, she'd add ground pork, ground shrimp and other ingredients, or sometimes just plain jook with side dishes like salted egg, dried shredded pork, or pickled radish (dua mo'n). Porridge is my comfort food, it is the equivalence of the chicken soup for me. Hot, light, non greasy, it totally cleanse up my system, works well for a healthy diet every once in a while :) hehe.

Porridge is extremely easy to make. All you need is about 1 cup of rice, or if you have left-over cooked rice, that would do too :-) Both the hubby and I have been a little bit under the weather lately, its usually dard and cool when I get home from work, so "jook" sounds like a good slurpy dinner recipe. I made a pot of just plain jook to be eaten with salted eggs (I also like to keep in stock either salted egg or dried shredded pork for rainy "jook" days like this)

Here's the simple steps to make plain porridge:

1. Wash 1 cup of rice, and drain (I add about 1/3 tsp of olive oil and mix well into the damp rice)

2. Boil a pot of water

3. Turn heat down to medium, add rice, watch and stir every so often to avoid boil over

4. (Optional) I also add some sweet corn, because I had some left over in my fridge.

5. Scoop off the foam if any

6. Add additional water as needed (depends on how thick you want your jook, I usually like my less thick and more silky, so I just add more water and cook longer)

7. (Optional) Add a dab of salt

As for the salted eggs, I've tried several brands from the Asian grocery stores, but this brand is so far my favorite. I don't really like the ones made in China, they seem overly salty. These are made in Taiwan, the eggs are not too salty, individually wrapped and that somehow gives me a warm assurance of quality. Now, as biased as it sounds, the kind I like best is still the ones my Mom makes herself (she does that once in a long while).