Quick and Easy Chicken

So I did my taxes awhile back and even though I'm getting a refund, it wasn't as big a refund I had hoped. Which means more scrimping and saving paycheck to paycheck.

Whenever I feel like I'm in a financial crunch, dinner gets scaled back to the basics. And one of my standby recipes is something I created in graduate school at Columbia in New York. In the dorm I lived in, there was this beautiful young woman who had a Caucasian dad and a Japanese mom. So the mix was this sweet, beautiful girl who always cooked with soy sauce and made everyone jealous during dinner time.

She was the one who introduced me to Mirin. No, that wasn't her roommate. It's the often-used rice cooking wine in many Japanese recipes. The following recipe is your typical teriyaki-style chicken, but with an extra emphasis on ginger and that sweet taste of Mirin. It's easy, uses very little ingredients, and is a hardy dish on a budget. Enjoy!