Three cup chicken

Three cup chicken is a classic Southern Chinese named three cups because there are equal parts rice wine, soy sauce, and sesame oil in the sauce. This is a highly requested dish by the Spork and I can see why since the meat is soft, sticky, and sweet and melts off the bone when pushed with chopsticks. The only sad part about this that three cup chicken requires a whopping 1/3 cup of sesame oil and if you buy the small sesame oil container like me that is about 1/3 of the container. We went to our local H-mart last weekend and despite our late arrival saw a package of chicken drumettes still left, and so this was the week of 3 cup chicken. The drumettes is the upper part of the chicken wing, but I’ve always found it much better to work with than the lower part which actually looks like a wing and is a little creepy. It’s a strange preference to have, but many people must feel the same way as me because the grocery store always runs out of drumettes before the lower part of the wing.

Three cup chicken is not very hard to make, since the ingredients are simple. It’s slightly time consuming when you are waiting for the chicken to simmer for 20 minutes so the sauce reduces onto the chicken, because you have to keep turning it to keep from burning. I turned every few minutes or so, so stayed in the kitchen the entire time. If you have a good TV show or youtube video to watch this could be a good time to watch and turn at the same time. A few months ago when I was studying for Step 3 I would probably have done flash cards during this time, but I’m happy to report I passed that and finished my less step exam of my medical career so I have not seen a USMLE  flash card for four months!

This is how brown you want the chicken to be before adding the sauce. It doesn’t need to be totally brown on every side, only a golden crisp on some sides. Below is the chicken with the sauce added initially before it simmers and reduces down onto the chicken.

Make sure you pick out the chicken from the sauce before serving and don’t pour the sauce on! Because of the sesame oil the residual sauce is quite oily so you don’t want to actually eat all that.

3 cups chicken

Savoring Spoon

5 from 1 vote

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Prep Time 10 minutes mins

Cook Time 20 minutes mins

Total Time 30 minutes mins

Ingredients

  

• 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
• 2 bundles of garlic about 10-20 cloves
• 3 inch piece of ginger peeled and sliced
• 1 bunch basil washed with leaves torn off
• 1.6 pounds chicken drumettes

Sauce

• 1/3 cup soy sauce
• 1/3 cup sesame oil
• 1/3 cup rice cooking wine
• 3 tablespoons sugar
• 1 tablespoon pepper flakes

Instructions

 

• Peel two bundles of garlic, no need to cut the garlic
• Peel 3 inch piece of ginger and slice to discs
• Make the sauce. Combine all sauce ingredients in a bowl and set aside.
• Add 1 tablespoon oil to the wok (or non-stick pan) and heat for 20 seconds till hot. Add garlic and ginger and stir for 1 minute till aromatic. Add the chicken drumletts and stir for 6-8 minutes until the chicken is golden brown as in the picture. Keep stirring to avoid burning the garlic.
• Give the sauce a good stir so the sugar disperses within the sauce, and pour over the chicken.
• Turn heat to small and let simmer for 10 minutes covered flipping the chicken at 5 minutes so all sides brown. Then turn heat to medium and simmer with lid off for another 10 minutes, stirring actively with your spatula to avoid burning. The sauce should be turning shiny and condensing on the chicken as the liquid component evaporates.
• Add the basil at the end, cover lid for 30 seconds to wilt the basil.
• Pick out the chicken and basil (leave the leftover sauce, most of it should be condensed onto the chicken by now) and serve hot.