Sweet and Sour Chicken

Sweet and sour chicken is a chinese origin dish where fried boneless chicken pieces are cooked in a sweet and sour sauce made with pineapple chunks, pineapple juice, ketchup, vinegar, soy sauce, pepper, bell pepper, garlic, onion and sugar. Fried chicken is made by marinating boneless chicken with garlic, salt, pepper, paprika powder, corn starch, all purpose powder, eggs and oil. The sweet and sour taste from the combination of pineapples, vinegar and ketchup surely makes this recipe an very tempting one! If you want something quick and simple try this, and tasty partner for rice!

TIPS AND TRICKS IN DEBONING A CHICKEN AT HOME

This recipe uses boneless chicken. Boneless chicken are really not always available in the supermarket (except for boneless cuts like chicken breast). If you can’t find one, Yummy Kitchen will save your day. Let’s have some quick notes on the easiest and quickest way to debone a chicken, if you will do this at home.

Deboning a chicken is a skill which takes practice. Each part of the chicken is deboned differently because of the different bone structures.

1. Prepare your kitchen shears and lay the chicken. The first thing to do is to cut the chicken into two. Open the backbone by cutting vertically and lay the chicken flat. Cut the other side to have 2 pieces of chicken. Crack some bones if needed.
2. Slice the thighs and breast, through the joint. Cut the drumsticks from the thighs.
3. For the chicken breast, cut he wing tip and the rib bones.
4. For the chicken legs, score the cartilage or the “handle” of the leg and then scrape upwards gently until the bone is separated.
5. For the chicken thighs, score the thigh bones and gently scrape the meat gently using a knife.

In recipes like the sweet and sour chicken, it is best learning the essentials of deboning and to use whole chicken.

HOW TO MAKE SWEET AND SOUR CHICKEN

This savoury dish will be composed of the crispy chicken bites and the delightful sweet and sour sauce.

Get your boneless chicken and cut them into small pieces. Prepare the chicken batter by mixing the seasonings and egg. We don’t want the breading to be too overpowering so we just use subtle ingredients. After cutting your chicken into bite-size pieces, let them submerge into the batter and then chill. Chilling helps the batter form and makes the chicken crispier.

Then, simply fry and then double fry the chicken pieces until golden brown.

Now let’s go to the highlight of this dish–the sweet and sour sauce.

The sweet and sour sauce might look extravagant but is actually pretty easy to make. This sauce will make use of the sweet and sour flavors from the pineapples.  In this recipe, I bought canned pineapple chunks and use the syrup as the sauce base instead of buying separate pineapple juice. To give it more flavor, I added umami seasonings like soy sauce and oyster sauce. It might be a bit of surprise but the sour aroma of the sauce really comes from the vinegar.

Saute the aromatics, pineapples and bell peppers and pour the pineapple mixture to let all their flavors combine into one luscious sauce.  Give it a little slurry just to thicken the sauce a little. Based on experience, do the final taste test after adding the slurry.

The last thing to do is to add the fried chicken bites into the sweet and sour sauce until it absorbs the sauce. Alternatively, you can serve them separate and use the sauce as a dip. Best partnered with hot steaming rice but can also be enjoyed as a snack. Yum!

Sweet and Sour Chicken Recipe (TAGALOG)

MGA SANGKAP

Para sa manok:

• 500 grams manok (walang buto)
• 2 butil ng bawang (hiniwa ng maliliit)
• 1/2 kutsarita ng asin
• 1/2 kutsarita ng paminta
• 1/2 kutsarita ng paprika powder (optional)
• 1/4 tasa ng cornstarch
• 2 kutsara ng harina
• 2 malalaking itlog
• mantika (pangprito)

Para sa sweet and sour sauce:

• 1 lata (227 g) ng pineapple chunks
• 1/3 tasa ng ketchup
• 3 kutsara ng suka
• 1 kutsara ng toyo
• asin at paminta
• 3 red at green bell peppers
• 2 butil ng bawang (hiniwa ng maliliit)
• 1 malaking sibuyas (hiniwa sa apat)
• 2 kutsarang asukal

PAANO LUTUIN

Para sa manok:

1. Hiwain ang boneless chicken ng bite-sized at ilipat sa malaking bowl.
2. Sunod na ilagay ang bawang, asin, paminta, paprika powder, cornstarch, harina at itlog. Haluin ng mabuti. Palamigin ito ng 30 minuto.
3. Magpainit ng maraming mantika. I-deep fry ang mga manok ng 8 – 10 minuto gamit ang katamtamang apoy hanggang maging golden brown.
4. Para mas maging crispy, i-double fry ang mga ito ng 2 – 3 minuto gamit ang mataas na apoy.

Para sa sweet and sour sauce:

1. Paghaluin sa isang malaking bowl ang pineapple syrup (galing sa lata ng pineapple chunks), ketchup, suka, toyo, asukal, asin at paminta. Isantabi.
2. Magpainit ng mantika. Igisa ang bawang at sibuyas hanggang maging light brown. Sunod na ilagay ang mga bell peppers at igisa.
3. Ilagay ang pineapple chunks at ang sweet and sour mixture. Haluin ng dahan-dahan.
4. Maglagay ng slurry para lumapot ang sauce. Hayaan ito maluto ng 1 minuto.

Sweet and Sour Fried Chicken

1. Ilagay ang pritong manok sa kawali at haluin para malagyan ng sauce.
2. Hanguin ang sweet and sour fried chicken at ihain kasama ng mainit ng kanin. Enjoy!