Simple Chicken Roast With Gravy

I love baking, grilling and roasting using the oven. Its simple, easy and you actually use one big roasting pan for everything you’re cooking. Or two at the most. Minimum washing, love it! This is a very basic chicken roast recipe with gravy that I make whenever I don’t feel like smelling like my food after cooking. Or when I am too lazy to spend my time cutting and preparing for a few dishes to eat with rice.

This recipe doesn’t call for fancy spices and no marinating is required. Just salt and pepper and well, the chicken. It works for one whole chicken of chicken portions. Since I am only cooking for two, I rubbed five chicken drumsticks thoroughly with salt and lay them on a roasting pan side by side. Then I ground lots and lots of fresh black pepper all over the chicken, making sure it’s coated all over. Pop it into the oven pre-heated to 200 degrees Celcius to roast for 30-40 minutes or until golden brown, then turn once and roast until the other side is browned (about 15-20 minutes).

Once done, set the chicken aside but don’t discard the drippings. Heat a pan on medium heat with 1-2 tablespoons of cooking oil. When hot, sprinkle two tablespoons plain flour or cornflour stirring to make a paste. Pour in the chicken drippings and 2-3 tablespoons of oyster sauce, stirring non-stop. Add in about a cup of water and let boil until thickened. Season with salt and pepper. Now you have the gravy ready!

Serve roast chicken hot with mashed potatoes, steamed peas,corn and carrots with gravy. Or, in my case, I served chicken with Hainanese chicken rice. If you intend to roast a whole chicken, follow the same method but roast it for at least an hour uncovered. If you like, you may roast it covered in aluminium foil for an hour and grill it uncovered until browned after. Throw some onions, kumara and potatoes to roast with the chicken too. Happy trying!

Malaysian Chicken Satay With Peanut Sauce

Our little project one weekend was to make Malaysian chicken satay with peanut sauce (which is also good for Pasembur, see end of post) - delicious spicy-sweet yumminess of grilled chicken meat on skewers served with a rich peanut sauce. There are many versions of Malay chicken satay recipe on the internet, this particular one was obtained from my friend Fariza who has tried, tested and proven that this recipe produces the most authentic Malay satay flavour!

The recipe is actually a simple one, but it calls for a variety of spices that I had to hunt around for. But once you managed to gather these, following it is easy-peasy. There are basically two main parts in executing this recipe; you have the chicken satay marinade, and the peanut sauce. Both of them uses similar spices but in different portions.These spices are galanghal, coriander seeds, cumin, lemongrass, turmeric and ginger. And oh also don’t forget bamboo sticks as skewers. Now, let’s get started!

Chicken Satay

1. Blend the following until a paste is formed:

• 1 teaspoons cumin seeds
• 1/2 tablespoon white pepper
• 1 and a half tablespoons coriander seeds
• 1-inch bulb of galanghal
• 1-inch bulb of ginger
• 2 stalks lemongrass
• 3 cloves garlic

2. Season the paste by stirring in the following:

• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 1 tablespoon honey
• 1/2 tablespoon turmeric powder
• 1 teaspoon salt

3. Cut up 500 grams of chicken flesh into bite size pieces, marinade at least 2 hours with all the above.

4. Once marinated, stick about 4-5 pieces of chicken bites onto a skewer. Repeat until everything is skewered.

5. Grill chicken satay skewers in an oven preheated at 180 degree Celcius for about 30 minutes or until cooked, basting once in between with the leftover marinade.

Peanut Sauce

6. Blend the following until a paste is formed:

• 1/2 teaspoon cumin seeds
• 1/2 tablespoon coriander seeds
• Half-inch bulb of galanghal
• Half-inch bulb of ginger
• 10 pieces dried red chilli or 1 tablespoon of chilli paste
• 1/2 tablespoon of dried shrimp
• 3 cloves garlic
• 3-4 medium onions
• 1 stalk lemongrass

7. Mix the following ingredients in a separate bowl:

• 150 grams of raw peanuts (shelled and skinned), pounded coarsely
• 3 tablespoons of sugar
• 1-2 tablespoons of tamarind paste diluted with 2 cups water
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon turmeric powder

8. Sautee the blended paste (step 6) in about half a cup of hot oil in a medium saucepan, stirring frequently until fragrant about 15 minutes.

9. Pour in ingredients of step 7 into the saucepan and simmer in low heat, covered for about 20-30 minutes, stirring occasionally. Season with salt and/or sugar if necessary.

10. Serve chicken satay with fresh cucumber and onion cubes, with hot peanut sauce as dip.

The result – very authentic Malaysian chicken satay! This recipe works well for beef and lamb too.

If there is leftover peanut sauce, don’t throw it out, we made our own version of Pasembur, a Malaysian-Indian salad out of it. We used blanched and cut Chinese Spinach (Ong Choy), boiled potato cubes, shredded carrots, beansprouts, boiled eggs (quartered) and fried wanton pastry broken into bite sizes then poured the peanut sauce over as dressing. For a more hearty meal, mix in a serving of spaghetti noodles, cooked slightly a little over al-dente. Finger-lickin’ good!

Oooh, writing this post makes me crave for some authentic Malaysian chicken satay and peanut sauce!

Happy trying!