Happy new year all! Hope you all had a great nite last nite. I went to my fav Chinese restaurant and had my fav dish there- Gai Kow - now it is just a simple meal, hopefully low cal, just chicken, mushrooms and chinese veggis (pea pod, bamboo shoots, water chesnuts and I think bok choy or chinese celery is the main ingedient) in a clear sauce. I am not sure what they put in it at this place, but just the smell is soooo good (I mean I had the leftovers for breakfast this am, cause it smelled so good when I opened the fridge this am) that I crave it regularly, but the restaurant is a bit out of my (normal) way.

Now I have tried gai kow at many other restaurants and usually it is just plain bland and has a variety of other chinese veggis in it. I have tried to doctor the others with garlic, onion, soy sauce etc, but have been unable to recreate the same aromatic taste of this one restaurant recipe. Not sure if it is the bok choy/celery or what. Anyone have any great recipes. I googled but not a lot came up. Not sure if this would be the same as MooGoo Gai Kow recipes. It is just Gai Kow on the menu.

Could this be it?

Good luck with your search- I know how frustrating recipe searches can be! I searched for an authentic recipe for yot gow mein for years with no real luck

www.Thai-Flavor.com: Authentic Thai Recipes

Flavored Rice with Chicken (Kow Man Gai)
Ingredients:
4 Cups water (nam)
2 Chicken breasts (gai)
1 Teaspoon salt (glur)
2 Celery stems, cut into 3 inch long pieces
2 Tablespoons vegetable oil (nam man)
7 Cloves garlic (gra tiem), lightly crushed
1.5 Cups of white rice (kow)
2.5 Cups chicken broth (nam gai tom)
1 Medium cucumber (tang gu-ar), sliced
Kow man gai sauce (use soy sauce as substitute) Flavored Rice with Chicken (Kow Man Gai)
Directions:
1. Boil chicken breasts in the water, add salt and celery.
2. Heat vegetable oil at medium heat, lightly brown garlic. Stir in rice and mix well over heat for 2.5 minutes.
3. Cook rice in a rice cooker or over stove according to direction on the box, using chicken broth instead of water.
4. Slice the cooked chicken into thin pieces and serve with rice and cucumber.
5. Serve with Kow man gai sauce, direction below.
Makes 2 servings

thanks, but I really do not see anything in that recipe that would be unique to the aroma / flavor this one has. I did find some (authentic) Moo Goo Gai Kow recipes that included oyster sauce and peanut oil or sesame oil and both had bok choy and mushrooms and garlic, so maybe I will try those. The other thing I was thinking that maybe the flavor was from a certain type of more flavorful mushroom.

That recipe you found is quite unusual though as I have never had anything with cooked cucumbers,