Long back I read about a Chinese delicacy known as "Beggar's Chicken" and was waiting for an opportunity to try my hands on it. It is the Chinese version of the roasted chicken dating back to the Qing dynasty. The process involves wrapping a whole spiced chicken in lotus leaves, then encasing it in mud and roasted in open fire. When fully cooked, the mud forms a hard shell around the chicken and cracked open before revealing the deliciously roasted chicken inside. As per the legend, a beggar in Zhejiang province stole a chicken from a village, and buried it in mud. He retrieved the mud covered chicken latter, and instead of cleaning the mud he just threw it in an open fire. This resulted in hardening the muddy shell around the chicken with a deliciously roasted bird inside. He then started selling chickens cooked this way and made a fortune for himself, also creating a Chinese culinary tradition known as "Beggar's Chicken".
Five-Spice is one of the main ingredients in making Beggar's Chicken. It is a roasted, powdered blend of spices like Cinnamon, Fennel seeds, Clove, Star Anise and Sichuan Pepper. It is mainly used in Chinese cooking as well in most of the Asian countries. All these spices are growing in our area too. Though I got all raw spices, I could get Sichuan pepper in powdered form only. Thanks to lmnopeas for her instructable on "Chinese Five Spice Powder" at: http://www.instructables.com/id/Chinese-Five-Spice-Powder/
I followed her instructable in making the Five-spice powder for the Beggar's Chicken recipe.
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