Moo Goo Gai Pan
Recipe from Rhonda Parkinson, About.com Guide

Popularized in the 1950s, Moo Goo Gai Pan is an Americanized version of a traditional Cantonese dish. The name comes from the Cantonese words for the main ingredients:

moo goo (蘑菇): button mushrooms (Agaricus bisporus)
gai (鸡): chicken
pan (片): slices

Moo Goo Gai Pan was one of the first dishes to become popular in New York’s Chinatown and in Americanized Chinese menus, cited with increasing frequency (with many different spellings) from about 1900. Lum Fong’s restaurant in Chinatown (220 Canal Street off Baxter Street) popularized many Cantonese dishes, and “Moo Goo Gai Pen” was a Lum Fong’s menu specialty for many years.

Moo Goo Gai Pan is usually a simple stir-fried dish consisting of sliced or cubed chicken with white button mushrooms and other vegetables. Popular vegetable additions include snow peas, bamboo shoots, water chestnuts and Chinese cabbage. Moo goo is different from other Chinese take-out chicken dishes in that it eschews the traditional “brown sauce” in favor of a light chicken broth-based sauce. A Chinese “white sauce” simply means there is no soy sauce used in making the sauce. Instead, a white sauce dish like moo goo gai pan uses chicken stock, fresh ginger, garlic, scallions, and oyster sauce.

3/4 pound boneless, skinless chicken breasts Marinade: 2 tablespoons [light] soy sauce 1 tablespoon rice wine or dry sherry A few drops sesame oil 1 tablespoon cornstarch Vegetables: 1 cup fresh button mushrooms 1 cup pea pods, cleaned and stringed 1 onion, sliced into 1/2 wide pieces 2 slices ginger 1 garlic clove

Sauce: 1/2 cup chicken stock 2 tablespoons oyster sauce 1 teaspoon sugar 1 tablespoon cornstarch 3 tablespoons oil for stir frying, or as needed

Cut the chicken breasts into thin strips. Add the marinade in the order given, adding the cornstarch last. Marinate the chicken for about 15 minutes. While the chicken is marinating, prepare the vegetables.

Wipe the mushrooms clean with a damp cloth and cut into thin slices. Clean and strings the pea pods. Slice the onion. Slice and chop the ginger, and peel and mince the garlic clove.  Prepare sauce ingredients and set aside.

Heat wok and then add 2 tablespoons oil. Add the chicken and stir-fry until it changes color and is nearly cooked through. Remove and set aside.

Add 1 tablespoon oil. Add the garlic and ginger and stir-fry briefly. Add the mushrooms and onion and stir-fry for several seconds, then add pea pods. Stir-fry briefly. Give the sauce a quick restir, then make a well in the middle of the wok and add sauce. Cook, stirring, until the sauce is thickened. Return chicken to wok. Mix together and serve hot with rice.

4 servings

Nutritional Breakdown based on 4 servings,
Calories 216, 9 g Carbohydrates, 17 g Protein, 12 g Total Fat, 1 g Saturated Fat, 8 g Monounsaturated Fat, 3 g Polyunsaturated Fat, 39 mg Cholesterol, 1 g Dietary Fibre, 676 mg Sodium, 297 mg Potassium.