Balsamic Vinegar Chicken

Balsamic vinegar is made from the ageing of the pressings from wine grapes and is thus, different from your traditional vinegar simply because it adds quite a powerful sweet yet tangy flavour to your dish. Here we have used it in a meat dish, but this versatile ingredient can also be used as other gourmet sauces and in vinaigrette dressing, where it can bring out the sweetness of certain fruits like berries. In this dish, chillies were added to give the sauce that extra kick, on top of the rich flavour you get from the meat which has absorbed the sauce upon prolonged boiling. Because of this strong flavour, the dish is great for eating ang moh style (with potatoes) or oriental style (with rice). Know that taste of the air in your mouth after you eat certain foods? That is what I define as 'aftertaste'. The Balsamic Vinegar Chicken leaves a pleasant mix of savoury/sweet air in the mouth after each mouthful which is not overwhelming particularly upon pairing it with the rice/potatoes. Yum.

Ingredients:

4 chicken leg quarters, skin intact
2 cloves garlic smashed
4 dried chillies seeds removed
1/2 cup balsamic vinegar
1 cup water
1/3 cup soy sauce
2 tbsp sugar

Directions:

1. Place all ingredients in a saucepan and bring to boil.
2. Simmer on medium heat for about 20 minutes.
3. Turn the chicken occasionally so that all surfaces are coated with the sauce.
4. Increase the heat and bring to a rolling boil to reduce the sauce into a sticky glaze. Remember to turn the chicken once in a while too.
5. Serve hot with rice.

Comments:

-You can also add other spices to suit your taste.
-Be careful with the sugar as the blasamic vinegar is already sweet.

We're here for food

Cool. Now we are all set up and running.. A brief explanation as to why this blog is very plainly called "Leic Makan". It is, in fact, a name of deep meaning and creative genius. Kudos to whoever thought of the name *smirk*

Anyway, I digress. Leic Makan is such a brilliant name because of 2 reasons

1. It is a Leicester-Singaporean-Malaysian combination, making Leic Makan an ideal name for suggesting our origins

2. It sounds like "Let's Makan" (genius!)

Chose this temporary blogskin because this shade of green is such an appetising colour. Well compared to the rest at least. Our web designer can change that eventually. Also added a C-box because people may not want to write full-length entries all the time.

All in all this is a fun Leicesterian effort consisting of what food we like and why we like it. This means food reviews from eateries not only in Leicester, but in Singapore, Malaysian and wherever else we care to tour in like Taiwan, HK, Europe... A considerable part of it will also be focused on cool recipes, usually simple enough to be undertaken by, say, a group of overseas students. This sums up the basic content of the blog.. Yum.. This should be fun

Itadakimasu P: