Thai Basil Chicken

The cuisine of Thailand is definitely one of my favorites. The flavors are so fresh, flavorful and leave that certain taste in your mouth, that once you have tasted it only makes you want bowls the size of kiddie pools full of the stuff. Thai food has a few key ingredients that make it distinctly unique in my book: limes, chilies, Thai basil and fish sauce. I know, I know...fish sauce. It doesn't have the appeal or allure of let's say Thai basil. However, it is one of those ingredients that by itself, wouldn't taste so great, but a dash of it makes the dish come alive and brings everything together. So don't skip on that.
This may seem like a complicated dish, but it's worth it. Try it and let me know what you think.

The Ingredients
1.5 pounds of chicken breast
1/3 pound green beans
1 red bell pepper
1 red onion
3 cloves garlic
1 lime
2 Thai chiles
1.5 cups of Thai Basil leaves
.5 cup chicken broth
1-2 teaspoons fish sauce
2 teaspoons soy sauce
vegetable oil
pepper
salt

The Method
The first step is to put the chicken breasts (wrapped in plastic wrap) in the freezer for 30-45 minutes. Take the chicken out of the freezer and take a sharp chef's knife out. The freezing will make the meat more firm and easier to cut. Take the breast and turn it so that you can cut it against the grain. Cut into thin pieces. Put into a bowl and mix with half the fish sauce and half the soy sauce to marinade for a while.
Then wash and prep all the vegetables. Cut off the stem side of the green beans and cut them into thirds. Cut open the bell pepper, remove the seed core, seeds, and ribs. Then cut the pepper lengthwise into 1.5 inch strips, and then cut those strips into small julienne. Next, the red onion lengthwise, cut off the ends and remove the skin. Make radial cuts following the natural curve of the onion to get long thin strips. This is called frenching an onion. Peel and mince the garlic.
Heat up a large pan on medium high heat with some oil. Toss in the garlic, and chicken and cook until it turns opaque. Remove and put it into another dish. Heat the pan up again and put some more oil into it.
Next, throw in all of the vegetables: bell peppers, green beans and onions. Sprinkle some salt and crack some pepper into the pan. Saute until the vegetables are slightly crunchy still but have loss the initial crispness about 4-5 minutes.
Zest half the lime with a micro plane and then juice the whole lime. Wearing latex gloves, unless you want burning hands and/or eyes, cut the chilies lengthwise and scrape out most of the seeds and rib. Cut the chiles into very thin strips.
Return the chicken into the pan. Put the sugar, remaining fish sauce, remaining soy sauce, chilies, lime zest, and juice into the pan. Cook for another minute, check for taste. More fish sauce or salt? Finally, add the heap of Thai bail leaves and toss to wilt. (Thai Bail is sweeter than normal basil) Another 30 seconds of heating and this dish is game, set, and a match for fluffy steamed jasmine rice.