Hainanese Chicken Rice – Singapore’S (Unofficial) National Dish Kevin F

YOUR GUIDE TOChicken Rice HAINANESE CHICKEN RICE – Singapore’s (unofficial) National Dish Kevin F. Cox, Culinary Explorer, explains what makes excellent chicken rice and where the best places to find this popular dish can be found in Singapore. in the same broth. This old-school often more telling of overall quality than method of true Hainanese chicken the chicken itself. It sounds so easy, but as rice originally came to these anyone who has had not-so-good versions shores, but gradually evolved into will tell you, it’s not. a newer “classic” version. Today, Then there’s the chilli sauce that comes the chicken is taken from that with every serving – a chilli-padi, garlic and boiling broth and plunged into an ginger elixir to drizzle, ensuring at least a ice bath, where the subcutaneous few drips on every bite. It elevates the gentle layer of fat seizes into paper-thin flavour with a touch of heat and acid, raising gelatin, rendering the slices of the dish to subtle yet soaring heights. pale meat and skin slippery and glistening. The heat of a diner’s A Flavour Experience mouth melts the fat, adding rich, For some, the preferred chicken rice is not here are few topics that will silky flavor to the tender flesh. Hainanese at all but rather a more Cantonese start passionate debate in version. Picture a whole roasted chicken, Singapore quicker than chicken Also it’s the Rice skin bronzed and crispy, sliced and served rice. Everyone has their own Good chicken rice is not just about the atop a mound of rice. More robust than its Topinion of how it should be and whose is best. chicken; it’s also about the rice. A purist Hainanese cousin, it’s an entirely different Because, like most hauntingly-delectable lightly fries uncooked rice in chicken fat, flavour experience. But for most Singaporeans foods which are seemingly simple, it’s never ginger and garlic, adding a coating of extra the only true chicken rice is Hainanese and the as simple as it seems. So just what is chicken flavor. It’s then boiled in the savory broth that better joints have devotees who would never rice and where can the best be had? cooked countless chickens before it – like a stray elsewhere. So which are the places baker’s starter yeast for sour-dough bread, that deserve such loyalty? Ask a hundred Begin with Herbs it never really runs out, just gets added to Singaporeans and you’ll get a hundred It all began with a simple dish from the Hainan as it’s depleted. The goal is perfectly tender different answers, but from that inquiry a few Province of China; a whole chicken boiled rice, moist but not clumpy, with chickeny will rise as the benchmarks against which all with herbs, garlic, ginger and pandan leaves whispers of ginger and garlic in every grain. others are measured. Here is a quick hit list of then sliced and set atop fragrant rice cooked It’s an integral component to the dish and five of them. Tian Tian Hainanese Chicken Rice delicately flavoured rice. To truly understand this Boon Tong Kee Maxwell Food Center, dish’s origins this unlikely place is a must. 401 Balestiere Road (plus five other locations) 1 Kadayanallur Street, Stall # 01-10 Probably the most entrepreneurial of all chicken or 443 Joo Chiat Road Five Star Kampung Chicken Rice rice establishments, their version is more modern, In addition to their remarkable chicken and 191 East Coast Road with thicker meat and a less oily texture. Popular always-perfect rice, their chilli-garlic-ginger sauce or 419 River Valley Road with the younger set, the growing chain is more is the undisputed champion, thanks to the use of or 6/7 Cheong Chin Nam Road attractive restaurant than eating house, with calamansi juice and other highly secret ingredients. This well-known establishment has perfected numerous other selections; most true chicken Probably the most popular and praised by celebrity the technique of seizing the gelatinous fat layer rice houses do little more than their namesake chefs like Anthony Bourdain and food critics beneath the skin to ensure a drippingly- – focusing just on the world over, anyone who knows Singapore’s moist flavour experience with perfecting the favourite dish knows Tian Tian. every bite. For the true iconic glutton, they will dish. Yet Con Hainanese Chicken Rice hack a whole 25 Purvis Street Kampong One of the last old-school institutions, eating chicken and here is like taking a lesson in chicken rice history, serve it with with sumptuously moist chicken au natural and the rice. www.asianjourneys.webs.com AsiAnJourneys | 45.

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