Great Oriental Roast Chicken
rec.food.recipes/Sarah (1996)

Last night I bought a whole chicken and decided to do it up. When my mother, who is Chinese, saw it; she laughed and called it Peking Chicken. Then she tasted it and flipped over it. Here is what I did:

1 Roasting chicken, duck, or 2 Cornish hens
1 tbsp. oil (I used olive oil that night.)
1 1/2 tsp. 5-spice powder
1/2 cup soy sauce

Clean and soak chicken in salt water for one hour...If you don't want to soak it in salt water, you can use white vinegar in place of the salt...(Soaking fowl pulls out the blood.) Rinse chicken well and coat with oil. Place chicken on a roasting stand. In a separate bowl, mix 5-spice powder with soy sauce. Brush half of the soy sauce mixture all over the chicken. Bake in a preheated oven at 400 degrees for one hour. Brush remaining soy sauce mixture all over chicken. Continue baking chicken till done...about another 40 minutes to 1 hour. Chicken should be crispy and brown. Serve immediately or wait till chicken is completely cool and cut up for lunches.