Vinegar, soy sauce and the (unofficial) national dish of the Philippines: Chicken Adobo

Vinegar, soy sauce and a handful of simple ingredients simmer distinctive flavor into this well-loved traditional Filipino dish. Recipe below.

INSPIRATION FOR THE THINGS WE COOK HERE COMES FROM MANY PLACES. And sometimes, it comes in pairs. The other day, Marion said she’d found a recipe for a beloved traditional Filipino dish, Chicken Adobo. I’d found another recipe for the dish the day before—and was so intrigued, I still had the tab open on my laptop. So we knew we had to cook it.

Chicken adobo is often considered the national dish of the Philippines. As with any traditional dish, there are many variations. But the sauce for most recipes is built on vinegar, soy sauce, garlic, bay leaves and black pepper—all ingredients most of us have on hand. Some recipes, including both the ones that got us started, include coconut milk. We liked how that sounded, slightly taming the tart vinegar to create a tangy but creamy sauce.

Vinegar and soy sauce—or salt—are the backbone of much traditional Filipino cuisine. Before refrigeration, they helped keep foods fresh longer in the tropical climate. Now, they serve as a well-loved, distinctive flavor profile.

Cooking chicken adobo is wonderfully straightforward: brown the chicken, add the sauce ingredients and let everything cook together. It takes a little more than an hour, but most of that time is just letting it simmer unattended. One thing that slightly puzzled (troubled?) me was browning the chicken with no seasonings whatsoever—I don’t think I’d ever done that before. Given that and the simple cooking and the modest list of ingredients, I wasn’t sure how it would be. The answer was delicious. Slightly tangy with a nice, subtle complexity and a little bit of heat, thanks to an optional Chinese red chili pepper. And even though it’s the consummate home-cooked meal, it was restaurant good—if we were served this dish in a restaurant, we would be happy.

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Chicken Adobo

Vinegar, soy sauce and a handful of simple ingredients simmer distinctive flavor into this well-loved traditional Filipino dish.

Course Main Course, Poultry

Cuisine Philippine

Servings 4 to 8 (depends on how many pieces of chicken you use)

Ingredients

• 6 to 8 pieces of bone-in, skin-on chicken (we used thighs—see Kitchen Notes)
• olive oil
• 1/2 cup reduced-sodium soy sauce
• 1/3 cup white vinegar (see Kitchen Notes)
• 1 13.5-ounce can coconut milk
• 1 teaspoon coarsely ground black pepper
• 2 bay leaves
• 3 to 4 large cloves garlic, minced
• 2 teaspoons sugar
• 1 dried red chili, optional (see Kitchen Notes for substitution)
• cooked white rice

Instructions

• Trim excess fat from chicken pieces. Heat a large sauté pan or deep, lidded skillet with enough oil to lightly coat the bottom over medium-high flame. Brown the chicken on both sides, working in batches, if needed. Transfer browned chicken to plate.
• Reduce heat to medium. Add soy sauce, vinegar, coconut milk, pepper, bay leaves, garlic, sugar and dried chili to pan, stirring to combine. Return chicken to pan, skin side up. Liquid should come partway up the sides of the chicken pieces, not submerge it. Add a little water if you need more liquid—we did not.
• Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to low and simmer, covered, for 50 minutes, turning the chicken a time or two.
• Remove lid, raise heat to medium or medium high and cook for another 10 minutes or so, until sauce is slightly thickened. Do NOT cook it too aggressively—you could cause the coconut milk to separate.
• Serve chicken over rice with plenty of sauce.

Kitchen Notes

Parts is parts. Most recipes call for thighs, drumsticks or both. We’ve also seen cutting up a whole chicken into eight pieces. We like the meaty juiciness of thighs. Choose what you like. Many recipes call for eight pieces (although one called for 4 to 5 pounds of chicken!). We had six pieces, so we used that.

Which vinegar? Plain white distilled vinegar is used in many versions of this dish—we like that, especially when using coconut milk. It adds the most tangy bang for the buck. Traditional Filipino recipes often call for cane vinegar, but we’ve also seen rice vinegar, apple cider vinegar and others. Use what you have.

Chili pepper. Singular. Chili peppers are only in some of the recipes we saw, but we like the subtle heat that adding one red chili pepper delivered—so subtle that you don’t notice it right away. You can leave it out if heat isn’t for you. The pepper we used was a small dried red chili pepper from the Szechuan region of China. These are sold in many supermarkets. You can also use 1/2 teaspoon or so of crushed red pepper flakes.