Chilli Chicken

Indo-Chinese Cuisine is my weakness; probably the same is true for most of the non-vegetarian Indians. When we grew up in nineties, India was yet to be globalized and the American or Italian cuisines like Burger, Fries, Pizza or Pasta didn’t make their entry to my home country. At that time, Chinese cuisine was the only option for dinning out. Calcutta has a long history of pioneering Indian style of Chinese food, mainly because of its reasonable Chinese population from pre-independence era. India’s only Chinatown is located in Calcutta and it’s the place that started the Calcutta’s famous roadside stalls of Chinese food. These food stalls adopted Chinese cuisine with mixing Indian taste into it.  Today the Chinese food has become an integral part of the Indian culinary.

Chilli Chicken is one of the popular dishes in this cuisine and I am going to share its recipe today. In abroad, we miss those road side stalls, the big wok, the smell of burnt garlic, soy sauce, the sound of stir-frying. So once in a while I try to make this dish at home because it’s both my son and husband’s favorite one.

In general, Chilli Chicken refers to a type of dry chicken preparations that is made with fresh chili peppers. There is no standard recipe for it and everyone makes their own version of this popular dish. There are multiple variations of chilli chicken recipes. More commonly boneless chickens are used in Chilli Chicken and batter-fried chicken cubes are stir-fried with onions and green bell-peppers. They are coated with hot and spicy sauce. Sometimes it comes up with little gravy, but generally people prefer to cook it dry or without gravy. It goes well with fried rice or chowmein. If you don’t like chicken, the same recipe can be tried with fish / vegetables / Paneer. 

I have learnt this dish couple of years ago and always make the healthier version which means that there is no MSG and with less sodium soy sauce and no food color.  You should find the recipe is easy and quick to prepare.

Recipe of Chilli Chicken : Serves 4

Ingredients :

Chicken : 1 lb/ 500 g ( around ), skinless, boneless, chicken breast or thigh, cut into bite-sized pieces

For Marination  and first part 

Vinegar : 1 tablespoon

Ginger paste : 1/2 tablespoon 

Garlic paste : 1 tablespoon 

Soy Sauce : 1 tablespoon 

Green Chili paste : 1/2 tablespoon 

Pepper Powder : 1/2 teaspoon ( freshly ground )

Cornstarch / cornflour : 2 tablespoons  

Egg : 1

Oil : for deep frying 

For the final cooking :

Oil : 2-3 tablespoons 

Onion : 1 big one, or 2 medium, cut into 1 inch chunk. 

Green Bell peppers / capsicum : 2 small, or 1 big, chop into 1 inch sized square pieces. 

Green chillies / green hot peppers : 3-4 (as per your tolerance ), chopped

Ginger + Garlic paste : 1 tablespoon 

Soy sauce : 2 tablespoons 

Tomato sauce : 2 tablespoons

Chili sauce : 2 tablespoons or as you need ( I used here Sriracha sauce ) 

Cornstarch / cornflour : 1 teaspoon

Water : 1/2 cup 

Spring onion / green onion / scallion : 1 stalk, finely chopped 

Salt : ( if needed ) ( all sauces have a lot of sodium. )

Method :

1. Wash and pat dry the chicken pieces. Take a big bowl and place the chicken pieces into it. Add vinegar, ginger paste, garlic paste, soy sauce, chili sauce, pepper powder to it. Mix it well and let it rest for 15 to 20 minutes. 

2. Remove the excess water from the chicken. ( if required ) Now add the beaten egg and cornstarch to the marinated chicken pieces. Mix it well again until the chicken pieces get a coat of cornstarch. 

3. Take a deep frying pan, add oil and heat it up. Deep fry the chicken pieces over medium high heat in small batches. Fry them till they get nice brown color on the both sides. Take them out from oil and place on a paper towel to absorb the excess oil. ( If you want to avoid deep frying, just add 2-3 tablespoons of oil and follow the rest of the process.)

4. Take a wok or a big pan, add 2-3 tablespoons oil. Once oil is hot, add the ginger garlic paste. Give some stirs and add chopped onions, green bell peppers and green chillies. Saute them for few minutes over high flame. Do not overcook, the onions and bell peppers should remain crunchy. 

5. Add soy sauce, chili sauce and tomato ketchup. Stir to mix it nicely. Add chicken pieces, stir and mix until chicken pieces are well coated with sauce. Check the seasoning and add salt or sauces if needed. Add the chopped spring onions and stir. If you want the dry version of Chilli Chicken. Switch off the gas and serve it with Fried Rice or Chowmein or can serve it as an appetizer.

6. If you like to have your Chilli Chicken with thick gravy, then mix the cornstarch with water and add the mixture to the prepared chilli chicken. Stir and mix it for couple of minutes over medium high heat. Serve hot. 

Related recipes you might also like :

• Chinese Fried Rice 
• 
  
• Chowmein 
• 
  
• Egg Drop Soup
• 
  
• Mushroom-Chicken 

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Chinese Fried Rice

Today I will share a recipe that is very common and everybody’s favorite one. It’s fried rice. We generally order this half of the times when we go to a Chinese restaurant. But we rarely make this at home though it’s very easy to make and doesn’t take more than 20 minutes. Fried rice is a dish of steamed rice, stir-fried in a wok, often mixed with other ingredients such as eggs, vegetables and meat. It has countless variations and different Asian countries make their own version of it. Some of them are popular worldwide like Indonesian Nasi Goreng, Thai Pineapple fried rice, and Filipino garlic fried rice and Chinese Fried rice. We Indians generally love the Chinese one because it has become integral part of Indian Food habits. So much so that street shops in some cities like Calcutta sell more Chinese style fried rice than any other Indian food.    

After experimenting for couple of years, I gathered some simple tips to make my fried rice perfect. Let me share these tips before starting the actual recipe:

1. Use long grain rice because short grain rice can stick together.

2. Cook the rice and then refrigerate it for couple of hours. This will not make actual fried rice mushy.

3. Use a big pan or wok and cook fried rice over high flame; this will help to get the burnt flavor. 

If you follow these 3 things, you can make fried rice like restaurant or far better and healthier  than that as most of the restaurants use MSG that is not good for health. 

Recipe of Chinese Fried Rice : Serves : 3 to 4 

Prep time : 20 minutes, Cook time : 10 minutes, Total time : 30 minutes 

Ingredients :

Rice : cooked, 3 cups ( long grain rice )
Vegetables : 1 cup as per your choice ( carrot / green bell pepper / cabbage ( shredded or finely chopped ) or peas / fresh bean sprout whatever you like ) 
Garlic : 4 cloves, minced 
Eggs : 2 
Chicken : 1 cup boneless and skinless, cut in long-thin strip or use leftover cooked chicken 
Cornflour : 1 tablespoon
White vinegar : 1 teaspoon 
Shrimp : 3/4 cup peeled and deveined without tail
Green onions / Scallions : 2  ( the white part and the green part separately finely chopped )
Oil : 5 tablespoon
Salt : to taste 
Ground Black pepper : to taste 
Soy sauce : 4 tablespoon 
Sesame oil : few drops

Method :

1. Marinate the chicken pieces with vinegar, soy sauce, black pepper and a pinch of salt for 10 to 15 minutes.

2. Take a large skillet or wok, heat it up and add 2 tablespoons of oil. Sprinkle cornflour to the marinated chicken pieces, mix well until they get a nice coat. Add the chicken pieces to the wok. Stir it until they are cooked. Once done set it aside.

If you use cooked chicken skip the above steps. 

3. Add oil to the same wok, add the shrimp and sprinkle salt and pepper. Saute it until they are pink. Once shrimps are cooked, keep it aside.

4. Clean the wok by scraping it off and add oil. Once oil is hot, add the garlic. Once garlic is lightly brown, add the white / onion part of scallions. Stir it for couple of minutes until fragrant. Add the vegetable and keep stirring for 2 to 3 minutes or until tender. 

5. Add the beaten egg and stir to scramble. Add the chicken and shrimp and mix it well.  Stir and toss between each addition. 

6. Break up the large clumps of rice and separate the grains and add it to the wok. Give some stirs.

7. Add the sauce and ground black pepper. Taste and check seasoning, add salt if required. Stir everything until the rice is well-coated and gets a light brown color. Sprinkle the green part of chopped scallions and the sesame oil. Switch off the gas and serve immediately. 

 Related recipes, you may like :

 Chow mein-Chinese Mixed Noodles

 Egg Drop Soup

Mushroom Chicken

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