sweet and spicy chicken drumsticks

There is a combination of spices, similar to the "5 spices", that I use specially for lean meat (though it's originally for fatty meat). This combination is star anise, cloves, cinnamon, cumin, hua jiao peppercorn, fresh ginger and fresh garlic, along with xiaoxing cooking wine, salt, black soy sauce and a very little bit of sugar. What I usually do is to cook 1-2 pounds of chicken feet in water and these spices and sauces. Allow the pot of ingredients to boil for 5 minutes. Then let it simmer for an hour. I often soak the chicken feet in the pot for half a day before serving. Then, the stock used to cook the chicken feet is saved separately from the solid spices. The solid spices can be chilled and reused 2 to 3 times before discarding. The stock can be frozen or chilled in small jars to be used as gravy. Because of the bones in the chicken feet, the stock becomes a very thick gel once it's cooled. This stock comes in very handy when I want to cook a meat dish. Here is one recipe.

Recipe: sweet chicken drumsticks with spices (for 2)

Ingredients:
- 1 to 1.5 cup of the stock of spices
- 1-2 tablespoons (TB) brown sugar
- 1 to 1.5 teaspoons (tp) kosher salt
- 1 tp crushed chili pepper
- 2 fresh chicken leg quarters, skinned and trimmed of all fat

Procedure:
1. Use a pot that can fit 2 drumsticks lying flat on the bottom. (Best to use the tightest fitting pot.) Melt the stock with brown sugar, kosher salt and chili pepper in the pot. Then place the drumsticks on the bottom of the pot. The liquid should cover up to half the height of the drumsticks.
2. Set the liquid to boil. Then cover the lid and allow to simmer for about 30 minutes, flipping the drumsticks every 10 minutes. Then turn heat off and allow the pot to sit on stove top for about 40 minutes.
3. 20 minutes before serving, bring the pot to a rolling boil. Allow the liquid to boil off gradually, while flipping the drumsticks every few minutes to allow both sides to be coated with the sauce. When the sauce starts to get very sticky, the sugar caramelizes. Turn heat off. Place the drumsticks on a serving plate and pout the thick sauce on top. Serve right away.

The leg quarter is very tender in this recipe.

An 11"-pan like this would cook 4 leg quarters in one go: