Wednesday (5/25): Yakitori

Bless you!...what?  You weren't sneezing?  That's the name of this dish?  Huh.  Okay, I need more info here...what exactly is Yakitori?
Yakitori is a Japanese grilled chicken skewer.  There you go.  Simple right?  Yep.  And tasty too!  I'm going to double the recipe to make sure we have leftovers for lunch the next day.  
This is a great dish to let your kids help with...they can easily thread the chicken and onions onto the skewers.  You can serve this with a side of rice noodles, steamed baby bok choy, or rice.  We'll have some edamame, noodles, and maybe some cucumber salad.
This dish makes a lot of sauce, so noodles or rice would be great to have on the side!  It's also very budget friendly (especially if you can get the thighs on sale)  But feel free to sub chicken breasts too.

Ingredients:  (recipe adapted from AllRecipes)

1 1/2 cups mirin

3/4 cup soy sauce

4 tablespoons sugar (you could also sub honey here)

1 garlic clove, pressed (optional)

1 lb boneless chicken thighs

1 -2 green onion, in inch-long pieces (optional)

8 bamboo skewers

Directions:

(note: if you have time, you could marinate the chicken in the sauce for added flavor for a couple of hours)

1. Put mirin, soy sauce, sugar and garlic, if using, into a medium-sized sauce pan, and cook over medium heat until there is only half as much sauce remaining.

2. Let cool slightly while you are preparing the chicken.

3. Cut chicken into bite-sized pieces; keeping the skin on is usual in Japan

4. Thread chicken onto skewers, alternating with green onion if desired.

5. Begin grilling the chicken skewers on both sides without the sauce, when the meat starts changing color, brush the sauce on both sides, and continue grilling, brushing on sauce about 3 times total, and turning until done.

Lookin' good on the grill!

Ready to eat!