Is cooking a learned talent, or is it bred, born within the soul at birth?  Is the raw, impressive, beautiful, expressive projection of the soul onto a plate nature, or nurture?  

That answer can’t be found today because while the Posey girls may be naturally amazing, we also came from the same mother, and with the exception of the fact that little Posey was allowed to go to the mall with boys WAY before I was, and allowed to move to Colorado before she could vote, and allowed to stay out past 11 when she was 16 while I had to come home by 10 until I was 18….so I think this sentence is officially a run-on, I’ll start over.  Basically, we were raised the same way and have the same genetics so nature vs. nurture can’t be solved with our examples.  But little Posey makes that chicken squawk until it’s delicious.  

Ingredients: 

• 1.5 lbs of chicken breast
• 8 Tbsp of soy sauce
• 5 tsp of cornstarch 
• 5 Tbsp of dry sherry
• 2.5 tsp of ginger root
• 2.5 tsp of sugar
• 1.25 tsp of salt
• 1.2 tsp of crushed red pepper
• 2 Tbsp of cooking oil
• 2 medium green peppers, cut into slices
• 7 green onions, cut into wheels
• 1 cup of walnuts 

• Here’s dear little Posey cutting up the green onions.  Isn’t she beautiful in her Christmas pajamas? 

• And here she is again, delicately cutting up raw chicken breasts into cute cubes.  Cute cubes without cuticles or carotids, because they’ve been slaughtered and cleaned.  I’m glad we don’t have a farm, I could never behead a chicken.  

• Gather your cup of walnuts on the side, measuring them ahead of time is really crucial.  What if you forget to do it, and then your hands are so covered in raw chicken that you can’t touch anything? One word people: Salmonella.  

• Here lies your dry ingredients in one bowl, pre-mixed like any good culinary student would do.  The soy sauce and sherry lies in the other measuring cup.  

• This is rice.  I know I didn’t discuss this earlier, but the chicken really is best served with rice.  Don’t fret, you can always skip it if you’re caught off guard here, pour the chicken over some cereal and call it done.  
• We used brown rice.  Brown rice is better for your spirit.  

• Stir fry your peppers and green onions first, using a Tbsp of olive oil in a hot pan.  Make sure your pan and olive oil are hot before you add the veggies.  I just read an article about how sad vegetables get when they’re dumped into a cold pan.  Do this for about 3 or 4 minutes, until they soften, and then add the walnuts for about 2 minutes.  Remove them from the wok to make room for the chicken.  
• Put your walnuts, green onions, and green peppers in a bowl.  

• Add another Tbsp or so of olive oil if necessary, and get it warm for the chicken.  It’s like when someone warms up a seat for you, it’s so nice to sit in a chair right after someone has gotten up, like a warm gift of butt comfort.  

• Once the oil is warm, add the chicken.  Ahh, the protein denaturing!  

• Stir it around, don’t let it get stuck to the pan.  This requires attentive cooking, don’t get lazy.  Laziness with chicken = gross walnut chicken, and the good walnut chicken is good enough to work for.  

• Mix your dry ingredients and soy sauce/sherry combo.  This, my friends, is your sauce.  

• Add it to your chicken once the chicken is fully cooked.  Don’t cause nausea, vomiting, diarrhea and other uncomfortable side effects from salmonella poisoning.  If it’s pink, you better think.  
• Stir until it’s thickened a little.  

• Add your veggies back in, and cook for another minute or so to warm it all back up and to marinate it all delicately.  

• She look so happy in her little apron.  And look how clean her clothes are!  Aprons have made quite the come back, and I have to say it was a trend I missed.  

• Here, lies the result of the labor.  Serve it with rice, or over captain crunch, whatever you have in your pantry.  Peanut butter flavored cereal would go well with spicy chicken….

• Our Christmas pajamas, that we were still wearing the day after Christmas.  Laziness at it’s finest.  

• Thing 1, Thing 2, and…Horton?  Whichever Seuss character has antlers.  

This chicken was so worth making.  We ate heartily, we ate well, we ate happily.