SRC Reveal: Welcoming the Year of the Goat with Bourbon Chicken

It's time for Group B's March 2015 Secret Recipe Club reveal. This month I was assigned to Family, Food, and Fun, a blog written by Rebekah. This was a hit. I served it to celebrate the lunar new year, the year of the goat, a few weeks ago. Gong Xi Fa Cai!

Rebekah and Grant have five kids, two furry babies, and five feathered friends. She cooks and bakes from scratch because she really wants to provide the best possible future for her kids through a healthy and well-balanced diet. I love her main food philosophies:

1. If my grandparents couldn't have eaten it when they were kids (1920's), we don't need to eat it either (ie, boxed, packaged mixes, high fructose corn syrup, aspertame and other artificial sweeteners, msg, partially hydrogenated oils, etc)

2. If the ingredient list includes items my third-grader can't read or pronounce, we don't need to be eating it.

So true, Rebekah. I had a lot of fun perusing your blog this month. I had a hard time deciding between Baked Creamy Chicken Taquitos, French Onion Salisbury Steak, and her Lemon Pepper Salmon. She also has a long list of sweets that looked dreamy as well. But, in the end, I opted for her Bourbon Chicken. I was intrigued by the name...only to find out that it didn't involve any bourbon at all. Well, I didn't add any bourbon either, but I did use two different kinds of garlic, added lemongrass, and tossed broccoli in to our finished dish.

 inspired by Rebekah's Bourbon Chicken

Ingredients

• 2 pounds boneless skinless chicken thighs, cut into bite-sized pieces
• 4 T oil (I used 2 T canola and 2 T olive oil)
• 2 cloves black garlic (click here for an intro to black garlic), thinly sliced
• 1 green garlic, thinly sliced
• 1/2 t minced ginger
• 1/2 t minced lemongrass
• 1 t red pepper flakes
• 1/4 C organic unfiltered apple juice
• 1/3 C organic light brown sugar
• 2 T organic ketchup
• 1 T unfiltered apple cider vinegar
• 1/2 C water
• 1/3 C low-sodium soy sauce 
• 1 head of broccoli, cut into bite-sized pieces
• cooked rice (I used an organic jasmine rice)
• black sesame seeds for garnish
• white sesame seeds for garnish

Procedure

Blanch your broccoli and set aside. Heat oil in a large, flat-bottom pan. Cook chicken until lightly browned.  Remove to a bowl and set aside.

In a the same pan, saute the black and green garlic until softened and aromatic. Add the remaining ingredients - to the soy sauce.  Bring to a boil.  Add chicken and broccoli to the pan, reduce the heat and simmer for 10 minutes.

Serve over hot rice with a sprinkling of sesame seeds. This recipe was such a hit that everyone at my table went back for seconds, or doubles as we call them...and they fought over who got to take the leftovers the next day.

Thanks, Rebekah, for the fabulous recipe.

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