And now for something completely different.
In Sydney, where I lived for almost ten years, there are multiple rival “portugese” chicken burger chains. I haven’t found anything vaguely similar anywhere else I’ve been, and since this was just about my favorite fast food when I lived in Sydney, I decided to reverse-engineer the recipe.
I’ll firm up the details, since right now it’s still “bucket chemistry” but here’s my formula which (in my opinion) tastes exactly right, is both healthy and low calorie, and is fairly quick to prepare, even in small quantities.
Ingredients
- Chicken Breasts (probably thighs will work fine too, up to you), sliced thinly (smaller, thinner pieces are yummier)
- Crushed Garlic
- Crushed Ginger
- Thai Chili Sauce and/or Chinese Chili Paste
- Chili Oil
- Olive Oil
- Lemon Juice
- Mayonnaise (I’ve been using Kraft’s Olive Oil Mayonnaise which is cheap, good, and easily found. Making mayonnaise from scratch is almost certainly even better).
- Bread Rolls
- Lettuce, Onions, Mushrooms, etc. — whatever you like on a “burger”.
Step 1: Marinate the Chicken
Make a marinade of olive oil, lemon juice, chili oil, ginger, garlic, and some kind of chili product (I use Thai chili sauce). Slice the chicken into thinnish sheets and soak it in the marinade. (You don’t need that much.)
Leave for 20-30 minutes.
Step 2: Cook the Chicken
You can put the chicken on skewers and grill it, or simply pan fry it (in a non-stick pan with no extra oil). The thai chili sauce has enough sugar that the marinade will caramelize and turn the chicken a luscious brown — beware that you don’t undercook the chicken (it can look well-done owing to caramelization when it’s still raw)!
Step 3: Make Special Sauce
No clue how the “real” sauce is made but, to my palate, this concoction works perfrectly. Make up sauce in proportion of 4 tablespoons of mayonnaise to 1-2 teaspoons of garlic, ginger; add chili paste to taste.
That’s it. By my calculations, it works out at around 300 kilocalories per sandwich (I suspect it’s a lot lower than the ones from Oporto, et al, because it’s a lot less greasy).
Final note: the “special sauce” is 95% of the recipe. You can skip the marinade altogether and just use the sauce on grilled chicken, and it’s pretty damn delicious. The sauce also works with Morningstar Farms “Chik Patties” (vegetarian fake chicken patties) and the marinade and sauce work just fine for Tofu too.