This Taiwanese Sesame Oil Chicken Soup is like a miracle worker. All of the ingredients in this soup have “warming” properties that can supposedly improve blood circulation, warm up those icy hands and toes, and help ward away the chill during the long winter ahead.
Food As Medicine
Winter is officially upon us! Do you know of anyone with poor circulation, someone whose feet or hands always seem to be cold, or perhaps a female friend or relative who’s just given birth and is currently recovering?
Well I’m no doctor, but I am a cook (anyone who’s felt stronger after a bowl of their grandmother’s chicken soup knows what I’m talking about!), and I have many “medicinal” recipes in my repertoire, like this Taiwanese sesame oil chicken soup.
In Taiwan, Sesame Oil Chicken Soup is a must-have for new mothers as well as elders, as it is known to nourish and strengthen overall health. Let’s look at a few of this soup’s ingredients through a Chinese medicine lens:
- Chicken: enhances physical strength (no wonder moms across so many cultures give their kids chicken soup to fight off colds)
- Black sesame oil: nourishes the blood (many black-colored foods like black rice, black seaweed, black dates, and black wood ear mushrooms are beneficial for blood health)
- Ginger: promotes circulation and expels cold/dampness
- Rice Wine, aka Michiu: stimulates circulation and improves overall energy (Qi)
There is an old saying in China: “万物皆生于春, 长于夏, 收于秋, 藏于冬, 人也亦之,” which translates to “All living things are born in spring, grow in summer, harvested in autumn, and hidden in winter. People are the same.”
I think the word “hidden” here also implies that wintertime is the perfect time to “feed” our bodies and gain strength.
This sesame oil chicken soup is just the kind of fortifying—and delicious—tonic our family needs, and the best part is––it doesn’t have to sit on the stove for hours. It only takes a little over an hour to make.
Recipe Notes
Ok, let’s get on with the recipe. I use chicken legs for this soup. They are not only affordable, they also stay tender after being simmered for an extended period of time in the soup.
If you want to make this soup a complete meal, feel free to add veggies like napa cabbage, soft tofu, or glass noodles.
If you do want to add these ingredients, add them towards the end and continue simmering the soup until the cabbage is tender the tofu is heated through, and/or the noodles are cooked.
Cooking tip: to prevent the chicken from sticking when browning, preheat your wok or pot (you must use a thick bottomed pot) until it starts to smoke slightly. Then turn down the heat and wait a couple of seconds before adding oil to it.
Sesame Oil Chicken Soup: Recipe Instructions
Rinse your chicken and pat dry with a paper towel.
Heat your wok or thick-bottomed pot over high heat until it starts to smoke slightly. Turn down the heat to medium, and wait a couple of seconds. Then add the black sesame oil, along with the sliced ginger. Cook for 2 minutes.
Turn up the heat to high, and sear the chicken legs (in batches if needed) until browned on all sides. Once the chicken legs are nicely browned, turn the heat back down to medium and add in Taiwanese rice wine, rock sugar, and water.
Cover and simmer over medium heat for 30 minutes. The soup should be bubbling, but not boiling. The idea here is to cook the chicken and intensify the soup’s flavor without cooking off the liquid.
The soup is ready once the chicken legs are tender. Season with salt to taste and garnish with scallions when serving.
Taiwanese Sesame Oil Chicken Soup (台湾麻油鸡汤)
Ingredients
- 3 lbs chicken legs (1.35 kg)
- 3 tablespoons black sesame oil (45 ml)
- 3 ounces ginger (85g, with skin on, cut into thick slices; if you don’t have a kitchen scale, just look for a piece of ginger that’s about 3 inches in length)
- 1 bottle Taiwanese rice wine (750 ml, aka Michiu)
- 20 grams rock sugar (or 5 teaspoons granulated sugar)
- 4 cups water
- Salt (to taste)
- 2 scallions (julienned)
Instructions
- Rinse your chicken and pat dry with a paper towel.
- Heat your wok or thick-bottomed pot over high heat until it starts to smoke slightly. Turn down the heat to medium, and wait a couple of seconds. Then add the black sesame oil, along with the sliced ginger. Cook for 2 minutes.
- Turn up the heat to high, and sear the chicken legs (in batches if needed) until browned on all sides. Once the chicken legs are nicely browned, turn the heat back down to medium and add in rice wine, rock sugar, and water.
- Cover and simmer over medium heat for 30 mins. The soup should be bubbling, but not boiling. The idea here is to cook the chicken and intensify the soup’s flavor without cooking off the liquid.
- The soup is ready once the chicken legs are tender. Season with salt to taste and garnish with scallions when serving.
nutrition facts
so good!
So glad you enjoyed it.
Thanks a lot! Will definetely try. Your blog is such a warm, welcoming place.
Thank you so much, Julie.
I used 3/4 a bottle of traditional michiu and the soup tasted like alcohol until I boiled it for almost 2 hours. The chicken turned out really tender though! I would suggest starting with 1/4 bottle of the michiu and 5-6 cups of water if you do not have time to boil for 2 hours. Otherwise a very hearty soup that reminded me of home :)
Oh I had the same experience as you! I love this blog and have made many recipes from here. This soup, I have made many times and have always added more water and less michiu AND boiled it for 2 hours. My husband is very sensitive to alcohol so when I cooked the soup for under 1 hour, his face was flushed red. But after I cook it for 2 hours, he had no issues. This is one of our favorite soups and we will keep making it, but tweaked to our taste. :)
Hahaha…ok, I hear you :-)
My dad always put the whole bottle of michiu – everyone was always in good “spirits” after having the soup! Thanks for including this recipe. Delicious!
That’s because everyone is warm and toasty inside :-)
Hi Judy! Love your site. My mother has requested this soup after suffering a stroke. She has diabetes, high cholesterol, and high blood pressure. Am I reading the nutritional value of Sugar 3% correct, with all the rock sugar? Is the cholesterol mainly from the black sesame oil? Would really like to try and tailor it to her diet, but make this. Thank you so much for providing recipes in English, so this ABC can follow!
Hi Vivian, this soup may not be as good for people with the health conditions that you mentioned. You should try this one: , and skim off the fat.
I have not tried recipe yet but I would like to get on your mail list
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Hi,
this recipe looks really great. I have two questions…
* Do I understand that correctly that “black sesame oil” is something different from “roasted sesame oil”?
* Could you give me the Chinese characters for the rice wine (I don’t know whether it would be labeled in the simplified or the traditional variant – and what the guys from the store who are from mainland China could understand better) so I can print them out and take them with me when I go shopping?
Hi Andreas,
1) “black sesame oil” in Chinese is 黑芝麻油，hei-zhi-ma-you. It’s different than regular sesame oil.
2) As for the rice wine, you can show the picture of the bottle to the store clerk. They can identify it easily enough.
Did I understand correctly? Is that en entire bottle of Michiu cooking wine? Sounds intriguing …
Yes, a whole bottle :-)
A whole bottle made the soup taste too bitter. I wonder whether its brand matters.
It is the brand, I did not taste any bitterness.
Could I add goji berries? or would that conflict with some of the other flavors?
Yes, you can add goji berries to this soup.
Can you substitute drinking sake for the Rice Wine?
Hi Linda, even though I have not tried it, I think it should work with sake. You can try it with half or 1/3 of the recipe.
Thank you for teaching me how to make this! It took me 3 tries to get it right and now I am able to shame my Taiwanese friends. I’m cantonese and I was able to make this for my best friends wife who is taiwanese after she gave birth to a beautiful baby girl. This made me very happy when she tried my soup and said that it ‘tasted like home.’ What made it even better was when I said that I am even more taiwanese then her since she couldn’t cook any taiwanese food of any kind.
Hahaha…good job, Richard! I can hear the pride in your words :-)