Pro Chef Tries to Make Chicken Teriyaki Faster than Delivery

We're reppin' the Mariners.

[Man] Who's your favorite Mariner?

Ichiro.

[Man] Well we have a surprise.

He's here!

What?

What?

[laughing]

Hi, I'm Melissa,

and today I'm going to make Seattle chicken teriyaki faster

than delivery.

[upbeat jazz music]

It think it is possible

to make Seattle chicken teriyaki

beating delivery,

kind of breaking a sweat.

[upbeat jazz music ends]

[phone ringing]

They're probably going to be so busy.

[Man] Hello, hello.

Oh, hi.

I was wondering if you guys have chicken teriyaki.

[Man] Yeah.

If I order, how long is it gonna take?

[Man] That would probably take around 10 minutes.

10 minutes?

Okay, I mean, oh, okay.

Thank you.

[Man] For delivery?

Oh no, yeah, for delivery.

Oh, that just depends on the app.

Okay, thanks.

So it's on its way.

All right.

Okay.

[screeching]

All right, so first if you haven't made rice in an Instapot,

it is a lifesaver.

So got rice here.

Oh my goodness.

Seattle chicken teriyaki is native

to Seattle and it is so different

from any other chicken teriyaki you'd get in any other city.

You always have a side of rice,

a salad,

the mac salad is creamy and sweet.

There's a lot of Hawaiian influences here

because the Pacific Northwest.

The keys to a really good Seattle chicken teriyaki

are a sweet and smoky chicken,

a thick and sticky sauce,

a creamy and sweet mac salad,

and a tangy and crunchy side salad.

The rice that you'll get

from the teriyaki is just standard white rice.

So we're not doing anything fancy here.

One to one water then my rice.

And then while I'm here I'm going

to get water for my pasta too.

[upbeat jazz music]

Then I'm going to make the chicken marinade.

So I've got a small pot here.

I'm going to put soy and I'm going to do rice wine vinegar

for the tangy and the acidic flavor.

Oh my gosh.

I'm going to take this off to go faster.

[laughing]

Brown sugar.

This gonna help with the stickiness.

This is the sweetness factor to the teriyaki.

Gonna add some dried shiitakes.

Then I have kombu.

This is dried seaweed to add more flavor.

Gonna get my blender ready for us when we're ready.

I'm gonna need a grill pan for grilling the chicken.

We've got cabbage and carrots for our cabbage salad

and I've got chicken that we can marinate.

I'm pretty sure that they're marinating

their chicken overnight

so they've got a little leg up on me.

But I think having some extra sauce on the side

will really help kind of bring back

that flavor that we're looking for.

I think next is the cabbage salad, right?

While I'm waiting.

So depending on the restaurant,

you'll usually get an iceberg lettuce.

You might get cabbage as well.

I'm using cabbage because I like the flavor of it better.

It's a lot more sturdy and it holds the dressing.

My sauce is almost boiling.

Carrots, we're actually gonna use two ways.

In the mac salad and the cabbage salad.

[Man] Say that again.

In the cabbage salad and the mac salad.

In the mac salad and the cabbage salad.

'Cause there's trains.

[laughing]

My sauce is bubbling.

Ginger is something that is very specific

to the Seattle chicken teriyaki.

Traditionally chicken teriyaki doesn't have the ginger.

So the ginger is something that's been added on.

I'm gonna just drain out my shiitake and kombu.

I don't wanna blend this in the blender with that on.

Oops, just kidding.

The raw flavor of the ginger

and garlic really comes through in the marinade.

So that's why I don't actually heat it up.

All right, time check.

18 minutes.

All right,

I'm gonna marinate my chicken.

So I've got boneless chicken thighs here.

I'm going to use three quarters of my marinade.

And then I'm gonna save a quarter

and put back the shiitakes and kombu

and let that thicken up.

All right, chicken is going to sit here and marinate.

My pasta water is starting to boil.

Elbow macaroni,

which is super classic for the mac salad.

That's gonna go in.

The thing about mac salad

that makes it even better is that you have

to make the noodles extra cooked.

If they're still crunchy it's not gonna be creamy.

Got my chicken marinating,

my cabbage salad,

and I'm actually gonna get my grill pan hot while I'm here.

[laughing]

All right.

The cabbage salad is super simple.

It's literally just carrots and cabbage.

Personally my favorite part

of that whole salad is the dressing.

It's pretty sure I could have that dressing on everything.

Time check.

Eight minutes.

Holy [beeping].

[laughing]

All right, I'm gonna get the chicken going

'cause that's gonna take a while to cook.

[Man] And 13?

13 minutes.

Okay, well, all right.

Chicken's going in the pan.

You can hear it sizzling.

I'm gonna switch it 'cause that fire's hotter.

I'm gonna start getting the things ready for the mac salad,

which are the carrots and then yellow onion,

which provides a nice sweetness to it,

and to also add some texture, bite, and crunch.

Yeah, time check.

10 minutes.

I've got seven minutes on the Instapot

so that's a good sign.

My pasta is going.

You can see the sauce in the back is starting to thicken.

My chicken is going on

and now I'm just gonna make the sauces.

The dressing is really special because it's so simple.

It's Kewpie mayonnaise.

Kewpie only uses egg yolks

and it also has MSG,

which is amazing.

It's a lot creamier in texture

and I like the flavor 'cause it's a lot sweeter too.

I'm gonna use some apple cider vin

and that's gonna helped cut it

and add more flavor to your mac salad.

So you can see the nice char.

That's what I want.

[laughing]

All right,

and then last but not least,

sesame mayo dressing.

Sesame oil is really strong so don't use too much of it.

I'm gonna use Kewpie.

That's gonna add to the creaminess.

Rice wine vin and then sugar.

So an aspect of this dressing is

that it's more sweet than regular.

So you want to find the balance between the sugar

and the vinegar.

Salt, and to add more flavor and umami,

our soy sauce.

I picked the smallest bowl to do this,

but it's okay.

[laughing]

You can smell the chicken.

Just trying to break down the mayo.

Oh my God.

That's so bomb.

[laughing]

All right, I'm gonna drizzle this on the cabbage.

Oh yeah, time check.

Four minutes and 30 seconds.

I think we might got it.

Instapot is done.

[steam blowing]

[laughing]

I have beautifully cooked rice.

My noodles

are overcooked and that's what we want.

Drain them over here.

I'm gonna rinse it with cold water.

I'm slowing down the cooking processes

and cooling it because you don't want a warm mac salad.

One minute 40 seconds.

So we might be ready for plating.

I've got my mac, my onions, my carrots.

I'm gonna add my mayo dressing.

Oh my gosh.

All right, I've got my large plate.

30 seconds.

Oh my gosh.

[upbeat jazz music]

All right, chicken is nice and charred.

[dramatic music]

30 minutes is up but I have all the components

for my chicken teriyaki.

[baseball park organ music]

And the sauce.

[baseball park organ music]

All right.

There is our chicken teriyaki.

[laughing]

[audience cheering]

So I'm just adding a little bit of sesame,

but Everything Bagel mix has sesame, onions, garlic.

It's so good but sesame seeds on top are nice.

Whew.

The delivery hasn't shown up yet so I think it is possible

to make Seattle chicken teriyaki beating delivery,

kind of breaking a sweat.

I am pretty confident in the cabbage salad

and the mac salad,

but I'm really excited to see

if the chicken teriyaki took the marinade that we made.

Okay, I think it's the delivery.

All right.

Thank you.

[Man] You're welcome.

Thank you so much.

Let's compare.

Their teriyaki looks a lot different than mine.

Their sauce is a lot,

it's a lot brighter than mine.

It's not as dark.

So I wonder if there's less soy in this.

This is their mac salad.

It's a lot smaller than mine.

And then their green salad is a cabbage salad.

There's water in it.

[laughing]

And then there's dressing.

Let's taste it.

It's still the sesame creamy mayo

but I think they don't add soy.

That's why it's so bright.

Which one would you eat?

[laughing]

[upbeat jazz drumming]

All right.

[upbeat jazz drumming]

It's cooked really well but it's really sweet.

Coating is really, really sticky,

which is a good note.

It has the teriyaki flavors but decisively sweet.

I don't have any notes of smokiness

on this teriyaki at all.

The mac salad has the black pepper, carrots,

and that overcooked mac.

Mm.

I don't think that they're using Kewpie mayo

but definitely it tastes like a mac salad

that I've had before.

The cabbage salad.

I mean, sorry, the iceberg lettuce salad.

It's still pretty crunchy.

The dressing comes through but it's not,

it kinda gets watered down.

Now I'm gonna try our 30-minute Seattle chicken teriyaki.

It is the char.

I think that my dressing could have definitely been

a little bit more sticky

because I should have added more sugar.

But I think the flavor is gonna be there.

You can taste the notes of ginger.

There's that smokiness.

I'm gonna dip it in a little sauce.

Mm.

Now that's the chicken that I remember growing up eating.

That's really good.

Next up I'll do my mac salad.

Just by looking at this,

I definitely probably could have added more mayo.

But the apple cider vinegar definitely comes through.

There's kind of a brightness to it.

Even though we put the dressing on a long time ago,

the cabbage is still crunchy.

[crunching]

Mm.

It's pretty good.

I think I did an okay job beating it and beating delivery.

[laughing]

All right.

So the four keys to a Seattle chicken teriyaki

are a sweet and smoky chicken.

Making sure that my grill pan was nice and hot

to be able to get that nice cheer.

Nice sear on the chicken.

[laughing]

A thick and sticky teriyaki sauce.

I think I could've added a little bit more sugar

to help it become a little bit more thick and sticky

but the flavor definitely was there.

A sweet and creamy mac salad.

So I made sure to overcook my noodles.

This is probably the only time

that you don't wanna have al dente noodles

because that overcooked noodle is going

to add more creamy texture to your salad.

And a tangy and crunchy side salad.

The rice wine vinegar that we put in the sesame

and mayo dressing brings brightness and flavor.

The iceberg definitely showed up a little bit more watery.

It was a lot more soggy.

I think using the cabbage adds a really nice,

crunchy texture that you know is going

to hold against the dressing that you make.

If I had to rate myself between a one to five star bag,

I would give myself a four.

I would've been a perfect five

if my sauce was a little bit stickier

and a little bit thicker.

I think for the perfect marinated chicken

it would be an overnight marinade.

But I think everything else was pretty good.

[Man] You think Ichiro would be proud?

I really think Ichiro would be proud.

[baseball park organ music]

[laughing]