Teriyaki Chicken-Asparagus Roll

This teriyaki chicken recipe is so good I made it twice in a row!

When I made the teriyaki sauce this time I didn’t hover over the stove
watching nervously.
By mostly ignoring it, the sauce cooked nice and thick, like honey.
It developed a delicious caramelized complexity.

This is a dressed-up-and-going-to-a-party version of teriyaki chicken.

Teriyaki Chicken-and-Asparagus Rolls

Asupara-maki Tori no Teriyaki
serves 4 as an appetizer, 2 as a meal

Soak skewers in a tall bottle.

page 201

• Soak 8 to 10 bamboo skewers for at least an hour

Marinate:

• 2 large boned chicken thighs, with skin attached
• 2 Tablespoons shoyu
• 2 Tablespoons mirin
• 2 Tablespoons sake
• 1 Tablespoon finely grated ginger

Combine the shoyu, mirin, sake, and ginger in a shallow bowl or small baking dish. Marinate the chicken for about half an hour, turning several times. Remove the thighs from the marinade and dry with paper towels. Discard the marinade.

Assemble and Grill:

• 6 thin spears of asparagus, cut to fit the thighs
• 1/2 cup teriyaki sauce (recipe)

Chicken thighs vary very much in size! Try to choose two that are similar! If they are uneven in thickness, make a horizontal cut to butterfly the thicker meat off to the side. With smaller thighs, pound the meat to even the thickness. Don’t pound too much or the skin will separate from the meat.

Arrange the asparagus on the chicken and roll. Secure cross-wise with bamboo skewers: thread the skewers through the overlapped part of the chicken in a fan shape. The long ends of the skewers make it easy to turn the chicken as you broil it.

Heat your grill or broiler. Place the chicken, skin side toward the heat and cook for 10 minutes. Turn and cook the other side for 6 minutes.
Remove the chicken rolls from the heat and apply a coating of teriyaki sauce to both sides. Return to the heat and cook for 1 to 2 minutes to dry the sauce. Repeat several times until the rolls are coated with a nice glossy layer of sauce.

Serving:

• warm the remaining teriyaki sauce
• mixed salad greens
• sansho pepper

When the chicken is cooked, twist the skewers to loosen them, but don’t take them out. Let the chicken sit for 5 minutes to cool slightly. Slice the rolls into 1″ disks. Lay the disks on a plate a bed of mixed greens. Drizzle with a little teriyaki sauce and sprinkle with a bit of sansho pepper.

Note: This is enough marinade to use 4 chicken thighs!

The first day I made this recipe, the thighs were very large and I cooked them to an internal temperature of 160°F. The next day, I applied and dried the sauce the same number of times but the thighs were small so the temperature came up to 180°F. Never mind! They still were good, unlike the way chicken breast would dry out. I’m liking dark meat more and more.

Note: I was using a boiler and my chicken was on a foil lined cookie sheet, so I applied the sauce one side at a time.

More Teriyaki Recipes from Tess

⇐ Previous Post		Next Post ⇒
Garden Tomatoes		Maize Gelée

Advertisement