Trim fat and excess skin from chicken. Cut fat into small pieces (1-2cm) and put into a bowl If you have time and want to make the skin tighter and nicer looking, you can blanche the chicken legs for 30 seconds at this point. Then submerse it in cold water or an ice bath. This will help the skin stay in shape when you cut the chicken after it’s cooked
If you want to make boneless Hainan chicken, make a cut around the drumstick bone on the inner side of the chicken leg. Do not cut through, only cut to the bone. Repeat for the thigh bone. Detach enough of the meat from the bone so that he bones are exposed. This will make deboning easier after steaming
Coat with one packet of Spicy Bake Mix. Mix well and set aside
Wash rice and drain water
Add 1 tbsp of oil into a pan at medium heat. Add chicken fat to render the oil. Once the fat pieces have shriveled, remove them from the pan. This oil will be used for cooking the rice. If you think that there is too much oil, remove some from the pan I like to have 2-3 tbsp of oil
Add garlic, half the shallots, half the lemongrass, half the galangal, ¼ tsp turmeric powder and 1 tsp salt and stir-fry for 2 minutes I purposely added only a little salt to accommodate for the sauces that go with the chicken. If you are not making sauces and want the rice to be saltier, you can add more
Add rice and stir-fry for 2 minutes until the turmeric powder has mixed with the rice evenly
Pour everything into the rice cooker and add 700ml of the broth or a little past the “4” line (since we used 4 rice cooker cups of uncooked rice) to compensate for the oil and added ingredients in the rice and press “cook”
Put the chicken with the slit side down in a dish for steaming I didn’t have any pandan leaves at the time, but if I did, I would tie it into a knot and place it underneath chicken legs
Put the rest of the shallots, lemongrass and galangal on top of the chicken
Steam at low heat (82˚C or 180˚F) for 30 minutes or until cooked. Steaming tip for stove top: Boil the water in the steamer first on high heat, put the chicken into the steamer and then reduce heat to low. For 1-2 pounds of meat with bone, cooking time will be around 30 minutes; 2-3 pounds, 45 minutes. Low heat steaming will make the chicken tender and juicy.
Prepare cucumber. You may choose to spread the slice cucumbers around a serving dish Besides using cucumbers, you can also use lettuce, tomatoes, cilantro or pickled raddish
Once chicken is cooked, let it rest for 5-10 minutes or until it’s cool enough to handle
Use kitchen scissors to remove the meat from the bones, keeping the meat in one piece is preferable for slicing If you’re not worried about aesthetics, you can just use your hands to tear the meat off the bone…rustic style.
Cut the meat into desired size and place on serving dish