Chicken Adobo

How do you mend a broken heart? No, it’s not what you think… Porgy and I aren’t going to Splitville – well, not that I know of anyway. However, something similarly tragic and saddening happened a couple weeks ago... we found out that Arthur has a lymphoma cancer. After seeing a vet oncologist for consultation, we decided not to do any treatments on him because it’s not fair for him (and for us) to have him suffer through all the medications that he has to take and the chemotherapy sessions that he has to endured just to prolong his life for possibly another year. He still behaves normally (very food oriented and ever so grumpy in the morning) and not showing any other lymphoma symptoms except the enlarged glands so we don’t have to do the inevitable thing anytime soon. I think he’s actually enjoying the fact that we are totally spoiling him nowadays.

Since we’re stuck at home even more (because we feel guilty if we do not spend more time with him), we decided to do some more cooking - Porgy made America's Test Kitchen’s Chicago-style deep dish pizza while I made NYTimes’ Chicken Adobo after reading the their article on how each Filipinos make Chicken Adobo a bit differently from the other person.

I have never made Chicken Adobo with coconut milk before so I thought it is kind of interesting that the recipe calls for it and the marinade mixture smells fantastic. Although I love the taste, I thought the vinegar is a bit too overwhelming in both the chicken and the sauce so if I have to make some adjustment to the recipe, I would cut back on the vinegar and maybe added some palm sugar to help the chicken to caramelize even more.


Ingredients:
1 cup coconut milk
¼ cup soy sauce
1½ cup rice vinegar
12 garlic cloves, peeled
3 whole bird’s-eye chilies or other fiery chili
3 bay leaves
1½ teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
3 to 4 pounds chicken thighs

Directions:

• Combine all of the marinade ingredients in a large, nonreactive bowl or resealable plastic freezer bag. Add the chicken and turn to coat. Refrigerate overnight or for at least 2 hours.
• Place chicken and marinade in a large lidded pot or Dutch oven over high heat and bring to a boil. Immediately reduce heat to a simmer and cook, stirring occasionally, until the chicken is cooked through and tender, around 30 minutes.
• Heat broiler. Transfer chicken pieces to a large bowl, raise heat under the pot to medium-high, and reduce the sauce until it achieves almost the consistency of cream, about 10 minutes. Remove bay leaves and chilies.
• Place chicken pieces on a roasting pan and place under broiler for 5 to 7 minutes, until they begin to caramelize. Remove, turn chicken, baste with sauce and repeat, 3 to 5 minutes more. Return chicken to sauce and cook for a few minutes more, then place on a platter and drizzle heavily with sauce.