Teriyaki Chicken

By Alan Beggerow

This dish is more in the style of Japanese cooking, as the chicken is cooked on a griddle, not in the wok, and separate from the vegetables. I use an electric griddle, and it works great. The dish can be made with chicken breast, but I prefer to use chicken thigh meat.

• 2 boneless skinless chicken breasts OR 4 boned and skinned chicken thighs
• teriyaki sauce
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 2 tablespoons sherry
• any kind of vegetables for stir frying

Cut up the chicken, in small thin strips. The thinner the better. Put the chicken into the freezer for a half hour or so. It will firm up the meat and make it easier to slice. Put cut up chicken in a bowl, add the sherry, garlic powder and teriyaki sauce. The meat doesn't have to be completely immersed, just well coated with the sauce. Marinate for at least 1/2 hour, up to 4 hours. The longer the meat marinates, the stronger the teriyaki flavor.

As meat marinates, prepare vegetables for stir frying. I like mushrooms, green onions, carrots and celery with teriyaki chicken. Just before you cook the meat, stir fry the vegetables, put the lid on the wok to keep them warm.

Preheat grill at 400 degrees if you're using an electric one. You can also use a cast iron skillet. When cooking vessel is hot, put 1 tablespoon of peanut oil on griddle. Let oil get hot, then use a pair of tongs to CAREFULLY put meat on griddle. There's going to be a good deal of sizzling and some spattering, so please use caution. Spread meat one layer thick over griddle and let sit for 10 seconds. This will caramelize some of the teriyaki sauce. After the initial 10 seconds, keep the meat moving Teriyaki sauce has a lot of sugar in it, so you need to keep the chicken moving or it will burn. You want to have a nice browning of the meat and a little charring is good, but avoid burning. Any marinate left in the bowl can be poured over the chicken while it cooks. Continue to keep chicken moving until done. Cooking time depends on how much chicken and how thin you've sliced it.

To serve, put stir fried vegetables onto a bed of rice or oriental noodles, then put chicken on the top. Pour a little fresh teriyaki sauce over the meat. The taste of the fresh sauce and the cooked sauce is just different enough to give the dish a good variety of flavor.

This can also be done with beef,pork, and seafood. An interesting variation is to slice up green onions and/or green or red peppers lengthwise and add to the marinate. They add more flavor to the meat when grilling.

The article Teriyaki Chicken was Submitted by Alan Beggerow through Articles.GetACoder.com network. Here's the additional information: Alan Beggerow owns and operates Cathleen's Bargain Basement, an online business that offers custom made apparel and hand crafted teddy bears by Cathleen, and also offers a selection of jewelry, home decor, Asian motif items, and much more. http://www.cathleensbargainbasement.com Alan Beggerow is also a free lance writer. Visit his writing services website, Ghostwriter, at http://www.ghostwriterboo.blogspot.com