This northeastern stew leans on dried mushrooms rather than fresh. Flower shiitake has a thicker cap, so it keeps a firm bite through a long braise and pushes a deep, faintly sweet mushroom flavor into the broth. One bird, one pot, and the noodles go in at the very end.
Northeastern Chinese · Main
Chicken Stewed With Dried Flower Shiitake and Glass Noodles
A whole bird braises with rehydrated flower shiitake, star anise and a lump of rock sugar, then a bundle of glass noodles drinks the last ten minutes of liquid.
- Prep20 min
- Cook45 min
- Serves4
- LevelEasy
Ingredients
| 1 | whole chicken , cut into large bone-in pieces |
| 10 | dried flower shiitake caps , soaked in boiling water for 10 minutes |
| 2 | star anise |
| 3 g | Sichuan pepper |
| 5 | bay leaves |
| 1 piece | ginger , sliced |
| 4 stalks | scallion , whites for the pot, greens to finish |
| 5 cloves | garlic , smashed |
| 1 tbsp | rapeseed oil |
| 1 tbsp | Shaoxing wine |
| 2 tbsp | dark soy sauce |
| 1 tbsp | oyster sauce |
| 5 g | rock sugar |
| 1000 g | hot water |
| 1 bundle | dried glass noodles , sweet potato starch noodles |
Method
- Soak the dried flower shiitake in boiling water for 10 minutes, then squeeze them dry and cut any oversized caps in half. Keep the soaking water if you want a darker broth.
- Heat the oil in a wide pot over medium heat and fry the ginger, garlic, scallion whites, star anise, bay leaves and Sichuan pepper for about a minute, until they smell toasted rather than raw.
- Add the chicken pieces and stir over medium heat for a full minute, then splash in the Shaoxing wine and keep turning until no pink patches remain on the outside of the meat.
- Pour in the dark soy and oyster sauce and toss until every piece takes on a glossy brown coat.
- Add the salt, the mushrooms and 1000 g of hot water, enough that the mushrooms sit under the surface.
- Drop in the rock sugar, bring the pot to a boil, then turn the heat to its lowest setting, cover and braise for 30 minutes.
- Add the glass noodles and cook a further 10 minutes, until they are soft and translucent but still have a little spring.
- Uncover, raise the heat and let the liquid reduce until it just coats the chicken, then scatter the scallion greens and serve.
Notes
- Salt early, before the water goes in. Once the pot is full the seasoning spreads through a litre of liquid and tastes weak at the end.
- The noodles keep drinking liquid as they sit, so pull the pot off the heat while the sauce still looks slightly loose.
- Dried flower shiitake is worth seeking out over ordinary dried shiitake; the caps are meatier and do not turn slimy.
Ratios and technique checked against 爱美食的拉拉 on Douguo (小鸡炖蘑菇). The method here is written by Stellaok; the photograph is the source kitchen's, credited on the image above and linked back to the page it came from. No recipe text is reproduced.