The Sinosphere · Volume 31, The Wok’s Breath, the Tea Trolley and the Coconut Coast
Baiqie gai, white-cut chicken
Guangzhou and the Pearl River Delta
An illustration of the dish, not a photograph of it cooked.
- Time
- 30 minutes
- Reviewed
- Not yet reviewed from inside the tradition
- Cooked
- Not yet cooked and reported
Guangzhou and the whole Pearl River Delta. No spice touches the water; the technique alone is the seasoning.
As tradition built it
Serves 4. 30 minutes active, plus resting.
Ingredients
- 1 whole chicken, about 1.4kg, free-range
- enough to submerge the bird plenty of water, unseasoned
- enough to fill a large bowl ice, for the shock
For the dip
- a small handful each finely chopped spring onion and ginger
- 3 to 4 tbsp groundnut or vegetable oil, brought to smoking point
- a pinch pinch of salt
Method
- Bring a large pot of water to a bare, gentle simmer, no rolling boil.
- Holding the chicken by the neck or a skewer through the cavity, lower it in, lift it clear so the cavity drains, dip it again, lift, a third time, then submerge it fully.
- Poach at the barest simmer for about 25 minutes for a 1.4kg bird, adjusting proportionately for size; the water should never return to a rolling boil.
- Lift the chicken and plunge it immediately into a large bowl of iced water, submerging fully, and hold it there until completely cold, at least 15 minutes.
- For the dip, pour smoking-hot oil over the chopped spring onion, ginger and salt, off the heat, so it sizzles and releases its aroma at once.
- Drain, joint the cold chicken, and serve with the dip alongside.
What a modern chef changes
An exact temperature and a real thermal shock, engineered rather than judged by eye.
Rung 4
Method
- Poach in a temperature-controlled water bath held at 74°C for around 3 hours for a whole bird, replacing the by-eye simmer with an exact, held temperature; the underlying method is unchanged, only the control is tighter.
- Shock in an ice-and-water bath at close to 0°C, holding the bird fully submerged until the internal temperature drops well below room temperature, exactly as the traditional method demands; do not shorten this step for a water-bath-cooked bird, it is doing the same mechanical work regardless of how the chicken was cooked.
- Add nothing to the poaching liquid, in keeping with Rung 4's own rule: the discipline is the seasoning.