Long-shelved chicken recipe no less tasty

Sometime in the distant past - before I had children, one of whom is about to become a teenager this weekend - I made a "New Discovery" in my kitchen.

A new wok in hand, sometime in the mid-1990s, I began trying recipes in "The Joy of Wokking" by Martin Yan. On page 94, I came upon Fried Five-Spice Chicken, labeled a "New Discovery." I deep fried a batch of five-spice chicken and knew the recipe was a good one for its fragrant spices and crispy chicken bites.

And then I forgot about it. One recent cold winter night, I pulled out the cookbook again and it fell open to page 94. I'm as susceptible to signs as ...