Time
30 minutes, then marinte for 1-2 days.
Ingredients
chicken feet: Fremont Costco started to sell them in 5+ lb packages this year. It’s cheap and fresher than getting chicken feet from Asian markets. pickled pepers: Must use Mexican style hot pepers, they add a bitter taste which is critical in this dish. Cheapest to get from Custoco business. vegetables: They are for color and fillers. Celery, carot, and even pears are all good, and you can even have more veggies than chicken feet.
vinegar: add vinegar if sourness from pickled pepers is not enough. sugar: this dish shouldn’t be aparently sweet. Add just slightly less than you can tell there’s sugar salt: to taste, and a bit less than in a salty dish.
Preparation
- Wash chicken feet, cut out nails so they look less scary.
- Cut chicken feet into 2 or 3 pieces. Cutting horizontally through palm-finger joint is the easist.
- Boil chicken in boiling water until color changes, about 5 minutes. Drain and put in ice/cold water to prevent further cooling. Chicken feet should be still firm and a little crispy after this.
- Generously add picked peppers along with their original marinade. Season to taste.
- Marinate at least half day. Veggies should be added later, about half day before serving. So that chicken feet and veggies are ready at the same time.
Notes
- You absolutely have to taste the marinade while seasoning. The balance of different taste is subtle and critical.
- during the soaking, meat and veggies absorbs taste in the marinade. So adding seasonings during marinating is acceptable and sometimes unavoidable.
Thoughts, and theorys of flavors in cooking
- There are 5 basic tastes (receptor cells on the tongue) and this dish utilize them all. Chicken feet provides umami (protein) and the reast comems from seasoning.
- A balanced flavor is a better accepted flavor. And because this dish utilized all 5 basics, none of the 5 can be too strong.
- I feel a good dish generally want 3 of the basic flavors, plus a few other senses. Mostly from smells(aroma) but can also include spicyness (a sense of pain & heat).
- In this dish, adding vegetable also adds flavor. But because marinated chicken feet is already flavorful enough, we add veggies later in the stage so their extra flavor doesn’t overshadow the main flavors.
- Sweetness adds the irresistible urge of eating more, which is generally required for appetizer or small bite dishes. While bitter taste pull you back and reconsider eating more. Combined, they create a distinct and memoriable feeling. Additionally because sometimes Sour (tangy) taste also applies the same effect. These taste contribute to the iconic taste of this peculiar dish.
- Hidden flavors (隠し味, or kakushi aji in Japanese) is small amount of flavors that enhance the main flavor of a dish. Here in this dish the vegetables and optionally bay leaves or star anise serves as hidden flavors to the dictinct flavor of crisp chicken feet skin (mostly collagen, and hopefully no remnant of feet).