This recipe is meant for making chicken soup, but if you get the right kind of chicken then you can take it out of the soup to make Hainan chicken. Two dishes for the price of one!

Chicken Soup (+ Boiled Chicken) #

• Prep time: 4 hours
• Cook time: 75 minutes

Ingredients (Serves 6) #

• 1 medium-sized chicken - They all look the same in the supermarket, but you want the kind that had yellow feathers when it was alive. The chicken should fill less than half your pot, since there are a lot of other ingredients.
• 1/2 of a napa cabbage
• 1/2 pack dried tofu skin/yuba
• 15 dried shiitake mushrooms - fresh ones also work, in which case you can just wash and use directly without soaking
• 2 servings of clear vermicelli
• 6 dried jujubes
• 2 inch piece of ginger
• 1 clove garlic
• 2 stalks of scallion/green onion
• salt

Directions #

1. Soak the shiitake mushrooms in water for 4 hours or so.
2. While the mushrooms are soaking, prepare the other ingredients.
3. Wash the napa cabbag and cut it into 1 inch sections.
4. Peel the ginger and slice into 1/4 inch slices.
5. Crush the garlic clove.
6. Remove the scallion’s root and cut each stalk into 4 pieces.
7. Wash the chicken, cleaning both the inside and outside carefully. Cut off the wingtips, feet, and neck but do not throw them away.
8. When the mushrooms are no longer hard, wash them and cut off the stem of each mushroom cap.
9. Boil water in a big pot. When the water is boiling, add all the ingredients except for the vermicelli.
10. When the water boils again, reduce the a simmer.
11. Check in after 15 minutes and skim off any impurities that appear at the top. If too much water boils off, add more water and bring the temperature back up.
12. After the chicken has been simmering for 45 minutes, take it out and let it cool down. Leave the the wingtips, feet, and neck in the pot.
13. Add the vermicelli to the pot.
14. Feel free to add more water to bring soup to the desired volume. If you do so, turn the heat up until the water is boiling, then simmer for another 15 minutes.
15. While you’re waiting for that, you can carve up or season the chicken however you like.
16. Take out the wingtips, feet, neck, scallions, ginger, and garlic.
17. Add salt to taste and serve.

Variations #

If you’re in a hurry, a simplified version of this recipe can be made using canned chicken broth. You can omit most of the other ingredients, just cook napa cabbage and fresh shiitake in diluted broth for 25-30 minutes, adding the vermicelli halfway through.