Cooking messy foods in a bamboo steamer without a cleaning nightmare For example, chicken.

I have tried:


chicken directly in steamer: chicken gunk goes everywhere, including between the woven bamboo slats.
chicken in a colander in the basket: gunk still goes everywhere.
chicken on a dinner plate in the basket: gunk controlled but chicken gets cooked in a bath of accumulated chicken juices and condensed steam. 
chicken on an upside down plate: gunk gets everywhere.
wrapped in banana leaves: good but don't have easy access to banana leaves and is this really steaming if they're wrapped up? Even on plates I feel I'm missing the rising steam and relying on the overall humidity in the basket.
sitting on banana leaves: again banana leaves are hard to come by, gunk problem still a bit of an issue.
using a new steamer basket each time: they're cheap but it's a bit wasteful... 


Is there a solution here?
My mom uses pieces of lettuce, cabbage, spinach or some other large, leafy green as a bottom for her steaming uses.  I can't explain why this works, but for dumplings and Shanghai-style dumplings, this prevents the pool-of-water below as you describe.  Perhaps it has something to do with the varied height with the leaves...offering the water pools a place to collect without staying in contact with the food.

This may or may not catch the chicken gunk you're referring to, but I think it's worth a shot.