The Best Flavour of Chicken

Cooking chicken is such a delicate operation that it requires a great deal of thought. At its best, the hsien (sweet flavour) is tasted not only in the skin, but also in the meat and marrow. The fat should be fragrant but firm, the meat tender and juicy, the bones succulent. This stage comes at a precise point between the inedible, metallic taste of raw chicken and fibrous dryness. How does one capture it? In the following recipe, these measures are taken:

Seal the skin to keep the juices in. The Cantonese method outlined below requires plunging the chicken into boiling stock, to firm the skin instantaneously.