Honey Glazed Chicken and How I Measure My Success

Last week, I wrote about how gender stereotype has led us to challenging expectation from society, specifically on my cooking skill and how it is irrelevant to the idea of settling down.

A lot of friends are encouraging and second the idea of ranting about feminism and good food, but some friends are just too lazy to read my blog and left comments exactly the way the stereotype goes. An irony. One left a comment ‘now all you gotta do is to find a husband to finish the food’. It ended up being (perfectly) responded by my fellow female friend saying ‘oh no need to worry, Vivi (and I) can finish the food with no help of any man!’. Some people seems to think that the idea of me cooking for myself, for my peace of mind is just not enough.

What is it with society and their obsession about limiting women's success rate to their marital status? 

Few weeks ago, there was this female moderator for a governor’s candidate debate that happened to be a 47 years old single woman. Comments were flowing in, and it came to no surprise that the majority of the comments are how it’s a shame that she is not married, and people speculated about the reason why she is not married, how she is a (quoting Chinese term) leftover woman; who are not desired by men. Fun fact: she has two master degrees from highly ranked universities, a news anchor, and has her own business, but no, they don’t see that as measurement of success for women. 

In other way, being married and/or a mother also hinder women to advance their career. I was interviewed by a state-owned enterprise for an opportunity for the past month, and throughout interview process (3 times by the way) they always asked me the same question, with the same 'sorry not sorry' notion to begin with.

My marital status, whether or not I have a boyfriend, and if marriage is one of my goal in short term. I was not very sure about their intention, but they always said, it's normal to get that kind of question if you are a woman. From my understanding is the fact that my marital status, and my intention to be single or to get married will affect me to achieve my career goal, and the fact that they don't ask this question to the male applicants are bothering me. 

Nevertheless, at some point I kind of understand where are this question coming from. In Indonesia, where our culture strictly rules women to be submissive, there is this common practice where married woman always go along with their husband no matter where they go, that woman, is the one who had to sacrifice their career for the family. There is this man, a self proclaimed ustadz once tweeted that those career women who take control of their life, and most probably also their relationship are scary women. 

What I wanted to highlight is actually whether a woman choose to be single, married, being a mother or childless there is always stereotype, where mostly are negative and will disadvantage them to achieve something. People need to stop creating this relevancy between gender, their marital status, or their motherhood for their ability to do work or vice versa

When I talked about this issue with an American friend, he told me that those very personal questions would be illegal in America. He also told me that I don't fall into the stereotype of the submissive Indonesian woman, quoting him "You will not go that far in throwing away opportunities for any man". I am not saying that it is something western, and I am not trying to say that if you choose to go follow your husband (or partner) it is something wrong. It's a matter of choice, personal choice, and society should not take that as a measurement whether they are succeed or not, the measurement of their success should come within themselves.

We talked about this while cooking Honey Glazed Chicken for brunch. My success rate in cooking this recipe is simply that the taste of the spices needs to be well absorbed to both the flour-mix and the chicken. The key is to also marinate the chicken with spices in addition of coating them with the flour-mix. 

But the hero of this recipe is actually the honey! The thing is, since we are using spicy sauce, some people prefer not to eat spicy food, so adding honey as sweetener and to reduce its spiciness definitely worked very well. You need to let this 3 ingredients sauce simmer and thickened for approximately 20 - 30 seconds before you add the chicken into the sauce pan and mix it well. 

As I cooked this for brunch, I completed the dish with a side dish of stir-fry pok choy with garlic so the overall brunch menu are balanced, not too sweet, and not too salty.

Good thing about this recipe is that you can substitute the meat with any meat. I never tried with fish tho, but since there are recipe of sweet and sour fishes menu so I guess it will also goes well with fish. 

Let me know if you try this recipe (or if you tried it with fish!)  by sharing it on Instagram, you can also tag me @anindyavivi and put #ObrolanDapurVivi #ViviKitchenRant on your post.  

Selamat Mencoba! 

Recipe for 2 servings:

Ingredients:

Fried Chicken

1/2lbs of boneless, skinless chicken breast (you can also use chicken wings), cut striped;

2 tsp of chili powder

salt and pepper to taste

200gr of all purposed flour

1 tsp of salt

1 tsp of pepper

1/2 tsp of garlic powder

1 egg, beaten
Oil to fry

Sauce

1 tbs of butter/margarine

2 tbs of spicy sauce (you can also use bbq sauce)

1 tbs of honey
Garlic Pok Coy Stir Fry
Pok coy, whole or chopped, as desired 
1 tbs butter or margarine
3 cloves of garlic, chopped
1 tsp of soy sauce
2 tbs of water
salt and pepper to taste 

Instructions:

 Honey Glazed Chicken

1. Seasoned the striped chicken breast/chicken wings with 1tsp of chili powder, salt and pepper. Set it aside for at least 10 minutes;
2. Mix the 200gr of all purposed flour with 1tsp of salt, 1 tsp of pepper, and the rest of chili powder, whisk it well; 
3. Coat the marinated chicken with flour-mix, beaten egg, then coat it again with flour mix; 
4. Heat the oil in low temperature, once it heated fry the chicken until golden brown (at least 10 minutes), drain, and set it aside;
5. Heat butter, once heated add 2 tbs of spicy sauce, let it simmer, then add 1 tbs of honey, mix it well and let it simmer; 
6. Add the fried chicken, mix it well until all chicken are coated with the sauce.

Garlic Pok Coy Stir Fry

1.  Heat 1 tbs of butter or margarine, once it melted add chopped garlic, saute; 
2. Add soy sauce and water, stir; 
3. Add soy sauce, stir fry, then add salt and pepper to taste.