Coca-Cola Chinese Chicken Winglets
Saturday, June 5, 2010 at 9:42PM 
coca-cola chinese chicken winglet
I'm not sure how it happened but the chocolate Coca-Cola cupcakes I baked earlier this week have spawned tonight's Coca-Cola Chinese Chicken Winglets.
Step son Daniel loved these chicken winglets served with steamed rice & stir fry vegetable shreds so much there was a slight "indignant outrage incident" afterwards when he asked me what I thought and I answered "it's okay"... Daniel was all "What do mean okay?? They are better than okay!!" "I love them!" ;)
You can use whole chicken wings or if you want to make the winglet shaped pieces for the dish you will need twice the weight of chicken wings in the recipe.
To make winglets; cut the chicken wing into three pieces, the centre piece will become the winglet, freeze the tips for future chicken stock and freeze the chubby pieces for another recipe.
The winglet is made from the centre piece of wing by firstly cutting an incision around the circumference of the thinner end of the wing piece, push back the skin to reveal two bones.
Remove the small bone by guiding your fingers down the bone to the end, pull to remove bone. You will now have one bone, move the meat of the wing down the with your fingers (use a paring knife to assist you if necessary) to produce a clean bone and neat rounded shape at the end of the bone. That's it, your first winglet!
Coca-Cola Chinese Chicken Winglet Recipe
Ingredients
1 kilo (2.2 pounds) of chicken wings or 2 kilo (4.4 pounds) if making winglets (preferably free-range)
800 ml (approx 27 fluid ounces) Coca Cola
200 ml (approx 7 fluid ounces) Soy Sauce
2 cloves of crushed garlic
1 tsp crushed ginger
3/4 to 1 teaspoon of Chinese Five Spice powder
I small red chilli, seeds & membrane removed, cut into a small dice
*2 tbs of Shaoxing Rice Cooking Wine (optional, replace with dry sherry or omit completely if preferred)
Method
Poaching; Place your chicken wings of winglets in a large saucepan, pour in 600 ml of the Coca Cola, add the soy, garlic, ginger, five spice powder, chilli and rice cooking wine. Bring to the boil of medium high heat, reduce heat and simmer for 20-25 minutes until cooked through.
Remove wings from the poaching liquid with a slotted spoon and set aside. Skim the chicken fat off the reserved liquid in the pot, bring to the boil and reduce the liquid until it starts to thicken. Taste at this stage, add reserved Coca-Cola if you want the sauce sweeter.
Add the chicken back to the sauce and reheat gently until chicken is hot and glistening with sticky sauce.
Serve with steamed white rice and stir fried vegetables.
*Note.. in a hurry? You can thicken the sauce without reducing by adding a slurry of cornflour (cornstarch) with water to the simmering liquid. You will to have to taste and adjust seasonings accordingly.
Winglets served alone are great for cocktail parties, functions and catered events... don't forget the finger bowls and napkins.
Happy Baking :)
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