Chicken and rice sounded good for dinner but I didn’t want to repeat the tasty balsamic chicken thighs so soon. I looked around the web and found this promising recipe on the Pressure Cooker Today web site. I made the recipe pretty much as written so there was no need to create my own copy – yet. If I make it again I’ll make a copy with my adjustments.
The sauce ingredients in this recipe spoke to me. It starts with 1/2 cup Gochujang sauce – which is one of my favorites. It’s got plenty of other things to create a nice taste profile.
After mixing the ingredients we reserve a cup for later use; combine the rest with a cup of (homemade) chicken stock and pour it over two pounds of chicken thighs and chopped onions that have been sautéd. It cooked for 15 minutes in my Instant Pot IP Duo 60 pressure cooker followed by 10 minutes of natural pressure release.
The next step is to put 1 cup of the cooking liquid into a small sauce pan and bring to a simmer – it takes only a minute or two since the liquid is coming out of a very hot pressure cooker. Then we stir in a slurry of corn starch and water to thicken the sauce. Finally we add that reserved 1 cup of sauce and cook it down for just a few minutes.
Put the chicken on a platter and cover with some of the sauce, passing the rest at the table.
Serve with some rice and a vegetable. Traditional would be Kim Chee but Carla roasted some broccoli.
Verdict: The chicken was good; the sauce was the star of the dinner. Carla and I bouth grabbed a bit more rice and loaded the sauce on. It leaves a lovely flavorful heat in your mouth for a few minutes. This is a very tasty dish – maybe not company ready yet but very serviceable for a weekend meal at home. I will brown the chicken a bit more next time – I did 8 minutes on medium and it could have used high heat or a few more minutes.
On the Pressure Cooking Today web site one person complained the sauce was not sweet enough – I found it more than sweet enough – The Gochujang sauce has a tiny bit of sweetness and I think the Hoisin sauce has plenty of sugar. I think next time I’ll cut the Hoisin sauce from 1/4 cup to 2 or 3 Tablespoons.
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