A Ma Chicken Rice

Name: A Ma Chicken Rice
Address: 7405 168th Ave NE Suite 140, Redmond, Washington, 98052, US
Telephone: (425) 242-0297
Price range: $
Rating: 4.4

$ • Asian, Asian Fusion

Hours:
7405 168th Ave NE Suite 140, Redmond
(425) 242-0297

About A Ma Chicken Rice

A Ma Chicken Rice is a busy and popular lunch place that is busy almost every day. The menu is small, with only seven main items, and the food is prepared quickly, taking five minutes or less to come out, almost like fast food.

The Combo Chicken Rice, which includes both crispy and plain poached chicken, is a highlight. The poached chicken is literally perfect. It is moist, succulent, juicy, tender, and silky smooth, with excellently rendered, gelatinous skin. It is so chickeny in flavor and is better than the crispy chicken. The crispy chicken is fried in a lightly crisp, rice flour-based batter but can be dry and somewhat uneven, with some flat portions that are tough to chew. The best item on the plate, however, is the rice. It is glistening with chicken fat and has a perfect sticky, yet soft and fatty mouthfeel. It is fragrant and lightly aromatic with garlic and ginger. The dish is a low fat, high quality meal. The plate also includes a light salad of mixed greens with thick cut cucumber, a quick pickled mix of cabbage and thinly sliced cucumber that is sweet and tangy, and two dipping sauces. One sauce is a mixture of sriracha, fish sauce and aromatics, leaning heavily towards ginger, with a fish saucy flavor and a mild, building spiciness. The other is a hoisin sauce mixed with similar aromatics, which is very savory, salty, and gingery. A light broth is also served; it has a heavy umami flavor, is not exceptionally salty, and is one of the most savory things one could eat.

Another dish is the Kuy Teav, a noodle dish reminiscent of pho. It has a lighter broth base and comes with a creative mix of meats including beefy and bouncy meat balls, sweet and tender shrimp, thinly sliced fatty pork, and small balls of ground pork. The rice noodles are firm and bouncy, though they can be served in an enmeshed mess.

The place is busy almost every day and can run out of food on rare occasions. The ordering process allows for both QR code ordering and ordering in person from a waitress. While the price, around twenty dollars, is not considered cheap, the quality of the poached chicken and rice is excellent, making the classic chicken set the best choice. The overall experience is highly rated, with the poached chicken and rice described as better than any Hainanese Chicken Rice from Singapore or Hong Kong.