Chicken Spare Ribs and Broken Rice

Just a simple dinner for a Friday evening at the LeHugh residence.

Grilled chicken spare ribs marinated in oyster sauce and lemon grass. Served over broken rice and decorated with sweet & sour Juliane carrots, cucumber and garnished with corriander. Don’t forget the fish sauce and fresh chilli.

Difference between long grain Jasmin rice and Broken Rice.

Do what the Asians do, get yourself a rice cooker and enjoy some quality rice. I think gone are the days when you boil your rice in water and then rinse it and add butter :-(  If you still do this, please contact me for a 1-to-1 chat!

The marinated chicken. Best to marinate for at least 2 hours before cooking.

If you’re like me and always pressed for time, you can buy the ground lemon grass from the freezer compartment of any Asian Grocery store. Marinade includes ground lemon grass, chilli paste (Sambal Oelek), oyster sauce, I like to add a little sugar but you can also add honey. It looks all kinda gooey, but only until it’s grilled

Prepare the garnishing.

A typical side for grilled rice dishes are marinated juliane carrots. Use a slicer and julian 1 large carrot for 2 people. Dilute a teaspoon of salt together with 4 tablespoons of sugar, a dash of vinegar and enough water to cover the carrots. Leave this to soak as you prepare the rest of the meal and the carrots should soften and take on a sweet & sour flavour when served with the meal. A refreshing side-salad.

Slices of cucumber and coriander is usually also added as garnishing and additional flavours.

Bring Ingredients together.

Start grilling the chicken and serve the broken rice into plates. Place grilled chicken in middle and garnish with carrots, cucumber and coriander. Drizzle generously with a mildly flavoured fish sauce and serve warm.

Enjoy.

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Now to the nitty gritty bits called ingredients:

Marinade:

• About 1kg chicken spare ribs mixed together with the following for marinade and sit for at least 2-4 hours
• 4 large heaped tablespoons ground lemongrass
• 4 tablespoons oyster sauce
• 1/2 teaspoon of sugar or 2 teaspoons of honey (remember these will burn faster)
• 1 large tablespoon chilli sambal oelek (or as per your taste)
• If you want to experiment, you can try a drizzle of soy sauce. For a less Asian taste, leave out the lemongrass and try worchestershire or mojo sauce for a different flavour

Fish sauce:

No not the pure stuff that comes out of the bottle, every meal is always accompanied by some form or another of the mixed fish sauce. For this particular dish, and for grilled meat dishes in general, the fish sauce needs to be very light so that it does not overpower the main dish.

Make sure you taste the sauce and adjust to your preference. I usually like a lot of lime in mine so the lime proportion is about the same as for the water, but this is not for everyone. Remember whatever isn’t used up can be kept in the fridge for up to a week.

• 2 tablespoon sugar (dissolve in 8 tablespoons hot water)
• 1/2 lime (or lemon)
• 2 tablespoon fish sauce
• 1 teaspoon sambal oelek

If you have questions ask me (via comment field below), if not, tell me how your creation went or post a picture on Facebook for us all to see.

BlueCloud.