Chicken with Chinese Hot Peppers

Here in Squirrel Hill there is a pretty good Taiwanese restaurant called Rose Tea Cafe, and on their menu is my favorite dish of all time: Chicken with Chinese Hot Pepper

I have always wished I could cook Asian food, which is my favorite continent of cuisine, and I have been eating out too much, but still craving this dish, so i thought I would give it a try.

Ingredients

• 4 chicken thighs, boned and cut into ~ 1 inch piece, you know, like in Chinese food.
• ~1-1.5 lbs Chinese green peppers, sliced into thin strips
• 1 bunch green onion, chopped
• Sauce (~3tbspn soy sauce, 2 tbspn rice vinegar, 1 tspn corn starch, 2 tspn sugar, dash sesame oil)

These were the peppers I bought from the local Korean grocery.  They had a sign reading "Chinese peppers" but the "hot" was conspicuously lacking.  Not to spoil the ending, but this lack of heat plagued the dish.  So good news if you don't like spicy food:  you can make this recipe and not worry!  Bad news for me, because I was missing the constant runny nose and vague sense of mouth fire that I crave. 

<insert me weeping a single tear>

The longest part of the dish was seeding and pithing the peppers, and then slicing them thin.  It is imperative to set up a sort of mis-en-place(sp?) involving the pre-mixed sauce, chicken, and onion/pepper mix.

Ready?

Heat a pan (or wok, definitely a wok--see below) on high heat and add enough oil to coat the bottom at a temperature where the oil will run freely.  Continue to heat until the oil begins to smoke.

Add the chicken pieces and stir frantically for 3min over high heat, then remove to a serving bowl.

Add a little more oil, then the peppers/onions and stir for ~5 min

Re-add the chicken followed by the sauce and stir for another 1 min, or until the sauce is absorbed and cooked down.

TaDa!

Here is the dish, it was very good although lacking in spice:

Also, here is my poor frying pan (our wk is back in CA):

Any ideas on a better pepper to use?  Maybe if I just include some of the seed I could boost the spiciness?

I have a second package of peppers in the fridge for another try.

Insalata Caprese

Unlike most posts here, which I write so that I can remember how to make food, this post in being written to share my favorite recipe.  I will never forget how to make it because a) it is dead simple and b) I make it 2-3x/month year round.

Insalata caprese is a 3 ingredient, uncooked, dish which means that it is ALL ABOUT ingredient quality.  Flavorless, unripe tomatoes will ruin it, and actual buffalo mozzarella takes it to the next level (for a while our local Costco sold giant tubs of authentic mozzarella buffala for $12.)

Ok, so you have assembled your perfect ingredients which are tomatoes, ovoline mozzarella, and basil leaves.  here is what you do with them:

• Slice the tomatoes thickly
• Put salt and pepper directly on the tomatoe (to taste)
• Slice the ovoline mozzarella more thinly, or in thick slices but cut in half, and place on top.  I usually do 1 ovoline per 2-3 tomatoes
• drizzle olive oil over this, or, if you have a Misto sprayer you can use that for an even coating
• top with a basil leaf

Look at that deliciousness!