RECIPE | No power? No matter. Rustle up Asian-style chicken in a Wonderbag?

I was recently reminded about a recipe I cooked in my Angela Day days. Angela Day, for those who are old enough to remember the food section of the same name, featured in The Star newspaper. I picked up the idea on a food trip to Australia in the mid-1990s. The recipe had strong Asian influences, which at the time were fairly novel in South Africa.

I found one that prompted the memory in the recently published Loadshedding Cookbook, produced by the Woolworths Taste team — No-cook soya-poached chicken. When I first discovered the idea in Oz, the unique flavour and deliciousness of the chicken became my go-to dinner-party dish, with much applause. Imagine a juicy, tender chicken bathed in soya sauce, garlic, ginger, star anise, chilli, lemon grass and Szechuan peppercorns, the flavours permeating skin and flesh cooked until it almost fell apart and served with jasmine rice to soak up the delectable juices?

Ok, so my recipe baked slowly in the oven in the days when load-shedding didn't exist, but the Taste one cleverly uses the Wonderbag to do the majority of the cooking.

Here's my recipe, which can just as easily (without power) be prepared in the Wonderbag. Because it needs at least five hours in the bag, I suggest preparing it the night before or first thing in the morning to be enjoyed for dinner.

AUSTRALASIAN CHICKEN

Serves: 6

Ingredients:

1 large chicken

750ml (3 cups) kecap manis, a sweet soya sauce, or use a light soya sauce and add a couple of tablespoons of brown sugar

1 litre (4 cups) chicken stock, don't make it too salty, so if using a stock cube, use one

3 cloves of garlic, peeled and left whole

A 3cm piece of fresh ginger, peeled and cut into slices

2 star anise

1 stick of cinnamon

5ml (1 tsp) Szechuan peppercorns or use black peppercorns

1 red chilli

1 stick of lemon grass, well bruised to release the flavours

Finely grated rind and juice of 1 lime

Method:

1. Remove the packaging from the chicken and any excess fat and set aside.
2. In a pot big enough to take the whole chicken and the liquid, combine the remaining ingredients and bring to a rapid boil on a gas burner. Using a large fork, carefully place the chicken, breast up, into the liquid. Return to a simmer, cover and cook for 15 minutes.
3. Using the fork, carefully turn the chicken over and cook covered on a simmer for a further 15 minutes, then turn the chicken breast side up. Bring to a rapid boil and, using oven gloves, remove the pot to sit snugly in the Wonderbag, securing the bag tightly.
4. Leave for 5-6 hours without opening until the chicken is cooked through and almost falling apart. If not return to the heat, bring to a simmer and cook for a further 15 minutes, covered. Remove the chicken to a serving platter.
5. Bring the sauce/stock back to the boil on the gas burner. Strain and serve with the chicken and jasmine rice to soak up the juices. Serve with steamed greens. Tender-stem broccoli is a good choice.