Better Than Takeout Chicken Teriyaki at Home

We can all agree that chicken teriyaki is one of the greatest dishes of all time. I’m gonna show you why you can and you should be making this dish at home in your weekly rotation. And it all starts with the sauce.

Why You’ll Love This

A simple teriyaki sauce has very minimal ingredients. While it might be easier to pick up a bottle of pre-made teriyaki sauce, you’ll end up with ingredients that you just don’t need. And that’s better than anything you get off of the shelves, okay? This is gonna last in your fridge like three months, four months. Although it’s not gonna last that long because you’re gonna use it in everything. You can make anything teriyaki. Salmon teriyaki, shrimp teriyaki, beef teriyaki. This is also great to add to marinades for grilled chicken. I’m trying to give you the best chicken teriyaki better than takeout, remember? These are very forgiving and they’re less expensive than chicken breasts. Teri translates to shine and yaki is like grilled or roasted. So at the end of the day, you just want a shiny sauce on some sort of grilled, roasted or broiled meat. I think a lot of people’s problem is that their rice sticks together.

Ingredients

About a cup of soy sauce (reduced sodium)
About a quarter cup sake
A few tablespoons of rice vinegar
A third cup of brown sugar
A pinch of crushed red pepper
A little ginger
A couple cloves of garlic
A whole bunch of green onions
Boneless, skinless chicken thighs
Basmati rice or long grain white rice
Butter
Water or chicken stock
A little bit of salt
Neutral flavored oil
A little bit of sesame oil
Salt and pepper
Broccoli
Oil
A little garlic powder

Instructions

A simple teriyaki sauce has very minimal ingredients.
Just keep it in a jar.
Just to save a step down the line in the cooking, I’m gonna go ahead and finish it off with the flavorings that I like.
Add a pinch of crushed red pepper.
All you really need is the chicken and this.
A little ginger and just kind of scrape that peel off.
Once it’s peeled, I’m just gonna grate it right into the pan along with a couple cloves of garlic.
Use a whole bunch of green onions, whites and green parts.
I’m gonna take out a little bit of the green to save for the top, but everything else is going in.
For chicken teriyaki, you gotta have the chicken.
Just kind of trim it and then just cut it into chunks.
Let’s cook it up.
I start out by sauteing my rice in the butter.
Get that melting.
Once the butter’s melted, in goes the rice.
Stir till each grain of rice is coated in the butter and it’ll start to become a little bit translucent.
Let it toast up for just about 30 seconds to a minute while I get my water.
Add a little bit of salt before I add the water.
Give it one little stir after we added our liquid and then leave it alone.
We’re gonna bring it up to a boil and then we’ll just give it one more stir, turn it down and cover it until all that liquid’s absorbed.
I’ll go ahead and heat my skillet up for my teriyaki.
I’m just gonna add a neutral flavored oil just to flavor my neutral oil.
I’m adding in a little bit of sesame oil.
Our rice is coming to a boil. So I’m just gonna give it one more stir, reduce the heat and then cover it.
Before I stir fry my chicken, I’m going to just season it with just salt and pepper.
I’m gonna drop my chicken in and I’m not gonna touch it.
Get it down in one layer and then let her go.
When the chicken’s brown, give it a little flip and then I’m gonna pull it out of the pan.
And to our drippings, I’m gonna grate in our ginger and garlic.
Give that a little stir to become fragrant.
I’m gonna add in that green onion and then the star of the show, our sauce.
About three quarter cup.
I’m gonna let it reduce and kind of do its thing for a while.
I’m gonna go back in and add the chicken so that it finishes cooking and then it gets coated and tossed in that deliciousness.
Heat up another pan.
Toss it with some oil, a little garlic powder, salt, and pepper.
I’m gonna put my broccoli in.
I like to put any flat sides down in the pan like that.
We’re gonna plate it up and I’m gonna finish it off with a special treat.
Down with some rice.
Beautiful glazed chicken.
Grab your glass and let’s make a cocktail.
The sake spritzer.
A little trusty bag of ice.
You could use gin or vodka, whatever you are feeling.
So just about half a shot.
Do about equal parts of the sake.
And to make it a spritzer, a little ginger ale.

Cooking Tips

You can always add salt later. You can just buy really small bottles. And I promise it’s gonna be worth the investment ’cause I’m gonna show you why. The sugar as it cooks is going to reduce and create that glaze effect. This is gonna last in your fridge like three months, four months. Although it’s not gonna last that long because you’re gonna use it in everything. You can add a little bit of garlic. You can add a little bit of onion. You can add a little bit of pepper. You can add a little bit of cilantro and toss your wings in it. You’re less likely to overcook it. These are very forgiving and they’re less expensive than chicken breasts, although you can totally use boneless, skinless chicken breasts. You don’t have to like strips or you can use whole chicken breasts or whole thighs. That could still be chicken teriyaki. Teri translates to shine and yaki is like grilled or roasted. So at the end of the day, you just want a shiny sauce on some sort of grilled, roasted or broiled meat. I kind of do like a reverse way to cook it. You know, the instructions will say to bring your water to a boil, then add your rice, stir. Ain’t nobody got time for that. And what this does is it coats those grains of rice and it keeps them separate during the cooking. I think a lot of people’s problem is that their rice sticks together. That’s A, because you don’t do this and B, because you stir it too much. You want each grain to be a little bit shiny. And listen, you can make as much rice as you want using this exact same method. The only thing you need to remember is that it’s two parts liquid to one part rice. If you wanna add more flavor to your rice, you could sub in chicken stock instead of water. Doing it this way takes also a little less time ’cause you don’t have to wait so long for your water to boil. Now here’s the crucial part that’s going to be the differentiator between gummy rice and fluffy rice is we gave it one little stir after we added our liquid and then leave it alone. Just don’t stir it too much. That’s how to activate those starches and make your rice really sticky. So we wanna get our skillet nice and hot. We are kind of doing this more like a stir fry method. So we know that that means high heat and lots of stirring. If you are up for it, I highly recommend adding this. I want it to develop a crust because you know I love to build that flavor. It’s not gonna be fully cooked, but almost cooked. That’s some good crust right there and it gives the flavor something to stick to. We’ll finish cooking it in the sauce. If you don’t have one of these, you could just finely chop it before and now is the time to toss it in. Traditionally, you would just bring this to a boil and let it simmer until it’s reduced and becomes shiny on its own. If you wanna speed up that process, this is when you could add a little bit of a slurry of cornstarch and water and it will thicken and get shiny in no time. You can see by all the bubbles that the sauce has started to reduce a lot. It’s about half to two thirds of the way done. Broccoli is just my go-to with this dish because I love how this sauce can get soaked into that broccoli. This is for like the best flavored broccoli. So you could do this same thing in the oven.

Serving Suggestions

You can just sprinkle it over rice as a quick side dish for your family. Toss it with roasted veggies. Down with some rice. Beautiful glazed chicken. This has got to be better than takeout.

Mmm. Oh, that warms my heart. It’s the two for one chicken teriyaki special. Please make it.