Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Rudolph the Quail Egg Christmas Chicken and Rice Bento

The nights around here are getting pretty chilly -- down in the 30s -- calling for some comfort food to warm up the bones during the day. I made a big pot of Vietnamese soy chicken drumsticks (method and recipe here). Even though I grew up with shoyu chicken, and the Hawaiian version was a childhood favorite of mine, I really love the distinct taste of this version. I think it might be the fish sauce that gives it that extra flavor punch. Or maybe it's the black pepper. In any case, I'm hooked. I made this batch on the stovetop, and it doesn't take more than an hour to get nice and fall-off-the-bone tender. I packed some in the apple box atop some furikake rice and some broccoli steamed in the same pot. Chicken and rice. It's delicious hot, cold, room temperature, whatever. You know what I mean? The top layer holds a satsuma mandarin, the ever-present sauerkraut and pickled cucumbers, a smattering of blackberries, and a shoyu-dyed quail egg Rudolph. It's Christmas, after all!

4 comments:

  1. thanks for sharing the chicken recipe! Now I know what I'm cooking today :) It looks SO good!

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  2. This is so festive! I love the cute little reindeer ^^ what did you dye the quail egg with?

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    1. I used shoyu; simply place the hard-boiled quail egg in a bowl of shoyu for an hour or so, rolling to color completely. Thank you :)

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