Filipino Chicken Curry & Rice

Chicken, Curry and Rice

Mary Jane Hall's recipe from Mama (Margie Perry)

When I was 5 years old, my family moved to Zamboanga City, Philippines as missionaries. In fact, my dad helped start a Bible college over there. We learned to love Asian food while in the Philippines and when we came back to the states (when I was 9) my mama fixed this dish. Then after I grew up and had a family of my own, I started making it, and it's always been a favorite of ours too! What prompted me to post this recipe is that my youngest son called and asked me for the recipe, and I thought I might as well share it on my blog. I hope you enjoy it! By the way, I loved living in the Philippines. It's beautiful there, and we had Coconut trees, Pineapple trees, Guava trees, Papaya trees, comonchilis trees snd banana trees in our yard! One of my favorite memories of living in the Philippines was the avocado ice cream! I've made it several times. And I always add avocado to my fruit salads with fresh fruit like they did over there. If you've never put avocado in your fruit salad you won't believe how delicious it is!

I will post a photo of this Chicken, Curry and Rice dish next time I make it!

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Boiled Chicken Pieces
(you can either buy a small whole chicken & cook it on the bone, chicken pieces already cut up or boneless chicken breasts/tenders) - I boil the chicken, let it cool and then take it off the bones. (Boneless chicken is easier!) 

Note: If you want your chicken to be very tender see below how I tenderize it before cooking to do what Chinese recipes say is "velvetizing" it. It's a quick easy step!

Steamed White Rice - plain (i don't even add salt to it, but you can - for you & Ashley just make 3 cups steamed rice, which is 1 cup of UNcooked rice. Unless you want to have left overs, make more rice :-)

Curry Powder - the yellow kind

Condiments - Peanuts, coconut, chopped green onions, golden raisins, chopped green pepper

When I was growing up we always just put peanuts on top, but sometimes now I like adding a little coconut & golden raisins. This goes very well with curry.

Curry Sauce - see below
For the curry sauce, all you do is make a white sauce (from any basic cookbook) and add curry. You can add the curry to taste and depending how much white sauce I make, I may use 2-4 teaspoons of the yellow curry, but if you like a strong curry taste, you can add more. Just add to taste.

Basic White Sauce (I usually make 2 - 3 cups of white sauce, depending on how many people are eating the meal)

For every 1 cup of white sauce, you will need: (this makes 1 cup, so you may want to double or triple it)

2 Tablespoons butter

2 Tablespoons white all purpose flour

1 cup warm milk

For curry flavored sauce - add 1 - 2 teaspoons of curry powder to the flour & butter mixture, before you add the milk.

Melt butter in large flat frying pan on low heat. Add the flour gradually, using a whisk to stir it & keep it from getting too thick. (Note: If you have your heat too high, the flour & butter mixture will get too thick way too fast, then it will have lumps that are hard to smash up) I used to add my curry powder after I add the milk, but I started adding the curry to the flour & butter mixture BEFORE the milk. After the curry is blended with the flour & butter, gradually add the milk & keep stirring on medium heat to let it bubble up & thicken. Keep stirring it with the whisk so it will be smooth) I warm my milk in the microwave first, because if you don't the flour will lump up! Believe me, this is an important step to warm the milk in the microwave. If you want more.

of the curry flavor add more curry powder to the sauce and blend well with whisk. Cook the sauce till it's the desired thickness. If it seems too thick for you, add more milk. If the sauce seems too thin, you'll need to thicken it w/ a little flour in hot water or with a little cornstarch in cold water.

Note: If you don't want to use dairy in this dish, you can substitute coconut milk or chicken broth for the milk, but we have always loved it with the basic white sauce + the curry.

Place rice on a plate, shred some chicken on top of rice, pour curry sauce over that & then add the peanuts, etc.Hope you enjoy this! Let me know if you have any questions.

To Tenderize Chicken: cut chicken pieces (against the grain) into 2" pieces. Place in bowl and toss in about 2 teaspoons baking soda, mixing to coat all the chicken. Let sit 30 minutes to 1 hour. Rinse before cooking. You can either boil this (but not too long) or you can stir fry it. You won't believe how tender it will be. There are other ways to tenderize the chicken (or beef)  too by using cornstarch, vinegar etc. You can find many YouTube videos on how to do this. It's so simple but so worth it! I'll never make another Chinese dish again without "velvetizing"  the chicken. I use this method when I make Moo Goo Gai Pan, Cashew Chicken, Almond Chicken, Kung Pow Chicken or any Chinese, Japanese or Thai dish!