I lived in NYC for 20 + years and cannot recall bourbon chicken being on the menu. I come down here to the malls and every chinese stand has it. I understand it is marinated in soy sauce.
I grew up in Louisiana and I pretty sure that it isn’t Cajun. It isn’t part of New Orleans cuisine (which is not Cajun either contrary to popular thought) either. It sounds like Chinese fusion cuisine.
Moved from General Questions to Cafe Society.
Gfactor
General Questions Moderator
It’s fusion, without a doubt. All the references call it “mall chicken.” Soy sauce and bourbon just aren’t in the same cookbook, until you find someone willing to fuse them. There are even people selling “marinade mixes” online. All you really need is soy sauce, brown sugar, ginger, vanilla, bourbon and a little garlic.
Bourbon chicken is in all the mall food courts in Upstate NY. Delicious, too, for mall food.
Related Note…
Ginger Beef (Breaded spicey Beef in Ginger sauce)
Originated in Calgary, Alberta, Canada
This may start a new thread about erstatz “chinese” food (chop suey, fortune cookies, etc)
Regards
FML
Damn straight, it is! The one place in Crossgates mall in Albany had for years a typod sign that advertised “Bouvbon chicken.”
To this day I still wish I took up my friends’ offers to help me steal it.
sigh
No such thing in Lafayette Louisiana in 1980, at least. I’ve never seen it in NJ or California, or in New York when I was growing up (pre indoor mall).
Heh, I had many lunches of bourbon chicken at Crossgates during college. It was good stuff, haven’t had it in years, though.
Whether it is cajun or chinese (or neither), I absolutely love that so many places in malls have it. These are usually the same places that give out the free samples (and there are usually 3-4 different ones in each food court), so I try to make a quick pass through mall food courts as often as possible for a quick snack…