Get Your Jelly On! Day 29 - The Winner (Chinese Shao Xing Wine Jelly with Chicken Roulade and Cucumber)

Remember the camera giveaway, well we have a winner....aka the Ravenous Rabbit.


She came up with this interesting combination of the famous Shanghainese drunken chicken with cucumbers to give it a crunchy texture, which I recreated for today's post....


Congratulations to her creation as it is a rather creative one that she insisted must have the crunchy cucumbers for texture.


 


In this classic dish, the sweet amber tones of the Shao Xing rice wine pair beautifully with the chicken, which has taken a form of a roulade.


Originally I had intended for it to be circles - chicken followed by cucumber but the size of the mould didn't let me do that. Of course as Murphy works his law, even the chicken pieces didn't stick to the mould and floated a little away.


 


Despite those little hiccups, I am still very pleased with the texture, taste and whole look of the jelly.




 


The jelly has a rather more-ish appeal especially when eaten cold as the Shao Xing wine adds a sweet taste to the chicken.


I reckon this will be the perfect appetizer for any meal to serve at home. Maybe the restaurants will start imitating the idea as I can imagine diners will be impressed.


Thanks again to all of you who contributed the ideas.


Chinese Shao Xing Wine Jelly with Chicken Roulade and Cucumber (Makes 2 moulds)


chicken roulade
1 whole chicken leg, deboned


wine layer 
100ml Shao Xing rice wine
50ml chicken stock
1 tablespoon gelatine powder


cucumber layer
150ml cucumber juice
1 tablespoon gelatine powder
1/2 Japanese cucumber, cut into thin slices


To prepare roulade: Place a large piece of cling film on a flat surface. Place the deboned chicken leg on top of it with the skin down. Using the cling film, roll it into a cylinder shape. Tie the two ends tightly to form the roulade. Steam over high heat for 20 minutes. Remove and soak in ice cold water to cool. Once cooled, pour away the chicken stock to use in wine jelly and cut into pieces. Set aside.


To prepare wine layer: Bloom gelatine powder. Heat stock and wine gently in a pot. Add to bloomed gelatine powder; whisk to combine thoroughly. Pour two tablespoons into mould. Freeze for 15 minutes to set. Remove and place chicken roulade pieces on the side of mould. Pour wine jelly mixture to cover. Chill to set.


To prepare cucumber layer: Bloom gelatine powder. Add 1 tablespoon hot water to melt. Add to cucumber juice; whisk to combine. Place cucumber slices on top of wine layer. Pour cucumber jelly and chill for 5 hours till set.


Unmould and serve straightaway as a cold dish.


Reminder: Support the cause by buying a Royal Selangor Nick Munro pewter mould as all proceeds go to breast cancer welfare association. For more pictures, see the Flickr set for all the whole Royal Selangor Jellyriffic challenge. To view, all the jellies, see this link to the Royal Selangor website.