Chicken teriyaki

Teriyaki sauce...who doesn't love the stuff.  The savory sweetness of it is just so appealing.  You can pretty much put it on top of anything and it's going to be addicting.

Since we have dessert often, I tend to shy away from sweet sauces for my stir-fries. However, this is a worthy exception.  Also, I have to admit that I was sometimes reaching for a store-bought teriyaki sauce anyway whenever I was looking for a quick flavoring so when I spotted a recipe for homemade teriyaki sauce a couple of years ago, I gave it a try.  It was truly so much better than what you can get from a bottle!

So I've been making this sauce once in a while for the last couple of years.  The other day, I realized I should post it here and spread the word so I cooked up some chicken teriyaki for dinner.  Of course, you could use this sauce for many things - from seafood to meat, vegetables to tofu.

The sauce is made with soy sauce, water, sweet rice wine (or mirin), brown sugar, granulated sugar, as well as grated garlic and ginger that give it such great flavor.  I simply place the ingredients, with the exception of the grated garlic and ginger, into a measuring cup, warm it for a handful of seconds in the microwave and stir until the sugar is melted.  Then, I stir in the garlic and ginger, and the sauce is done.  

I use it as a marinade, as a glaze or sauce.  If you want a thicker consistency - to create a sauce you can pour over a final dish - you can thicken it with a cornstarch slurry.  In this case, I took some of the teriyaki sauce to marinade chunks of chicken (I used thighs) that I tossed with a small amount of cornstarch, then I stir-fried it in a skillet until cooked through.  Near the end, I add the remaining teriyaki sauce I reserved to the pan.  The sauce will thicken slightly and coat the chicken as you stir it all together.  You end up with plenty of sauce to pour over the final dish.

Of course, you need rice!  I served this chicken teriyaki with brown rice, letting it soak up all that sweet teriyaki sauce.

I would just like to point out that you need sweet rice wine, or mirin, for this homemade teriyaki sauce recipe.  Mirin is an ingredient you'll run into often for Japanese dishes.  It is quite distinct and I highly recommend seeking it out to use here.  This is the one I use:

And a quick word on the garlic and ginger.  I grate both using a microplane and a little goes a long way here.  I have a tendency to go overboard when it comes to adding ingredients like garlic to dishes but I've found that you can use too much here so I would stick with the recommended amounts.  You'll find that at the end of cooking, the grated garlic and ginger might be sitting at the bottom of the pan.  Depending on how strong you want it, you can leave some or all of it in the pan since the garlic and ginger flavors have already permeated the sauce enough.  

This teriyaki sauce is handy for stir-frying like I did with the chicken.  When summer comes, it's great to whip some up for barbecues.  Recently, I used it as a marinade and sauce for some stove-top pork chops that I cooked in a cast iron skillet.  

It's all good!  And I'm going to confess something...my affinity for teriyaki sauce goes way back.  Do you ever go to a Japanese restaurant and order a bento box?  Well, I used to literally get a bento box with say, beef or salmon teriyaki, and I'd proceed to dip my sushi (yes, my California and/or spicy salmon rolls) in the teriyaki sauce! Apparently, regular soy sauce wasn't enough for me back then.  I don't do that anymore - as tempting as it is - but I enjoyed every bite of it back when I did.  That's my confession of the day.

Recipe:

Chicken Teriyaki

Teriyaki sauce recipe adapted from Majerle's Sports Grill via Food Network

- Serves 4 - 

For teriyaki sauce*:

1/4 cup soy sauce

2 tablespoons water

1 tablespoon sweet rice wine (mirin)

2 1/2 teaspoons light brown sugar

2 tablespoons granulated sugar

3/4 teaspoon grated garlic

3/4 teaspoon grated ginger

For chicken teriyaki:

1 lb. chicken thighs, cut into 1-inch pieces

White or black pepper, for seasoning

1/2 teaspoon cornstarch

2 teaspoons canola oil

Optional garnishes and for serving: Toasted sesame seeds, thinly sliced scallions, and rice

Make teriyaki sauce: Place soy sauce, water, mirin, brown sugar, and granulated sugar into a measuring cup.  Heat in the microwave for 10 seconds, stir until sugar is dissolved (if necessary, pop it back in the microwave for another 5-10 seconds).  Add garlic and ginger and stir together.

Make chicken teriyaki: Place chicken thighs in a bowl and season it with some white or black pepper.  Add 2 1/2 tablespoons of the teriyaki sauce (reserve the remainder) and the cornstarch, tossing to coat.  Marinade at room temperature for about 20 minutes, or make it ahead and place in the refrigerator for several hours (remove from the refrigerator about 20 minutes before cooking).  

Heat a large non-stick skillet with the canola oil over medium-heat.  Add chicken in a single layer, let cook without disturbing for about 2 minutes, to allow it to brown and caramelize.  Stir and continue to saute until chicken is cooked, about 5 minutes or so. Add the remaining reserved teriyaki sauce to the pan, toss to thoroughly coat the chicken. Cook for about a minute to allow sauce to thicken slightly, then transfer to a serving plate.  Top with sesame seeds and scallions, if using.  Serve hot, with rice.

* For a thicker teriyaki sauce, you can make a cornstarch slurry by combining 1 teaspoon of cornstarch with 2 teaspoons of cold water.  Heat teriyaki sauce in a small saucepan, add cornstarch slurry and stir until thickened.