cooking with disaster
You know, one of the problems with being overconfident in your abilities is that sometimes when you screw up, you literally have to eat it. I'd like to think that I can cook, and this has occasionally resulted in disasters ranging from a mild-case of food-poisoning to severely charred charcoal briquettes that were supposed to have been some sort of bakery product. Fortunately, tonight was not to be one of those nights. I attempted to make satay peanut chicken from memory, and it actually tasted pretty darn good. To the best of my knowledge, the recipe runs as follows:
- Cut a chicken breast or breasts into bits, and
- rub half a teasppon of pepper and salt onto it.
- Oil your favorite eight-inch pan with half a tablespoon of oil, preferably Mongolian Fire Oil cut with a little olive oil (depending on how much or how little one values one's taste-buds) at medium high heat, and
- brown the chicken.
- Once browned, remove the chicken, but leave the grease and drippings in the pan.
- Slice and toss a quarter to an eighth of an onion into the pan to absorb some of the oil and grease, stir-frying it at high heat to a mild carmelization.
- Reduce the heat to medium, and then pour in:
- a third of a cup of peanut butter,
- a tablespoon of low-sodium soy sauce,
- half a tablespoon of chili powder,
- and a third to a quarter of a cup of chili sauce (or if you value your esophageal lining, a quarter cup of water and another quarter cup of peanut butter).
- Stir this mixture until the peanut butter melts, and
- toss in
- the chicken and
- half a cup of chopped red bell peppers.
- Cook until done, and serve over rice.
Should anyone out there attempt this recipe, please let me know how it went - and feel free to vary the ingredients. Cooking is an improvisational form of art as much as it is a science, and the best recipes are robust and either survive or are improved by individual variation.