Recipe for Chinese brocolli (kai lan) with rice and sesame chicken
This is my recipe for Kai Lan and rice with sesame chicken. I know that it is not a very complicated dish but I like it and it is healthy. And you dont get fat like a panda bear from eating it. 🙂
So you need this:
1 Kai Lan (that is Cantonese how it is called in an Asian supermarket in the Netherlands but it is also called Chinese brocolli in English and jie lan in Mandarin): make sure that you buy with strong leaves and good green colours (not yellow or weak).
2 Rice (in our Asian supermarket we like from Yume Nishiki Premium Rice) - it is Japanese and not Chinese. The quality is very good!
3 Chicken breast (must be firm and shiny and with good colour)
4 Garlic (get fresh ones because sometimes parts are bad and too old)
5 Shallot (make sure it is firm and has not bad spots)
6 Oyster sauce (we use from Lee Kum Kee Panda Brand)
7 Soy sauce (we have Haday Superior Light soy sauce)
8 Sesame sauce (i cant find the bottle in the kitchen but it has a yellow label)
9 Sugar (white sugar not brown sugar)
Prepare rice
First put the rice in the rice cooker because that takes the longest time. We like good quality rice from the Asian super market and that has a nice texture and taste.
Prepare Kai Lan
For the Kai Lan I like to do the following:
- Blanche the kai lan for 1,5 minutes in boiling water and add half spoon normal oil and half spoon sugar. The blanche makes sure that the kai lan stays healthy with vitamines and that you dont loose it when cooking it.
- Wash the kai lan with cold water. BUT you must take care that the cold water drips away because if you wok it, it must not steam because of water.
- Put oil in a wok and you can add the garlic and shallots but they must not be tiny but nice bigger pieces. And this you can do for a minute. The fire must not be too high!
- After the minute put fire at lowest. Add half spoon oyster sauce and half spoon soy sauce.
- Put on fire high and add the kai lan and make sure that you mix it with the shallots and the garlic. But the garlic cant burn because that is very bitter. You can add water a little bit every time that is needed (but not that it starts to steam).
- After couple of minutes the Kai Lan is ready but add some sesame oil or salt. I prefer sesame oil (like 1 spoon). The kai lan must be nicely wokked but still firm enough when you eat it.
Combine with a chicken or a fish dish or maybe a tofu dish
My mom normally makes the chicken when i prepare the kai lan so I am not very sure about everything. But you can add a chicken or fish dish that you like or a tofu dish. We like chicken with sesame seeds and ginger and spring onion in soy sauce. I can maybe edit this post later if I ask her how she makes that if anybody wants to know.