Xiao Wan's General Tso's Chicken

Read on to see how to make General Tso's Chicken

Ingredients:

-1 and 1/4 diced chicken breasts
-1 egg
-1 cup of all purpose flour
-scallion, garlic, ginger, fresh or dry chili pepper

Sauce:

• 1/2 cup water (I personally think it's redundant to use chicken stock.)
• 1 teaspoon soy sauce
• 2 teaspoons dark brown sugar (I don't like to abuse the use of sugar.)
• 2 teaspoons rice vinegar
  
• 1 tablespoon Shao Xing cooking wine
• 1/2 teaspoon pure dark sesame seed oil (I like to use dark sesame oil for this dish as it is very strong, concentrated and more flavorful.)
  
• 2 tablespoons of tapioca starch or sweet potato starch (I never use corn starch.)

I often improvise as I cook, so you may find the need to adjust certain things to your personal taste.

Mix all the above well in one bowl and set aside.

Dice chicken breast. Marinate the chicken in mixture of 1 beaten egg, 1 tsp Shao Xing cooking wine, 1/4 tsp pure dark sesame seed oil, ground black pepper and white pepper, 1 tsp soy sauce for about 15 minutes. Toss the marinated chicken in flour.

Set burner to high heat and deep-fry chicken pieces until golden brown

Place the chicken on wax paper or paper towels to dry. Drain/dispose of most of the oil (leave small amount of oil on the pan.) Add cut scallion, chili paper, chopped ginger, minced garlic and stir fry about 45 seconds until sauce mixture is thick. Be sure to stir continuously. Add chicken to the mixture in the pan and quickly cook until all is coated with the sauce. Do not prolong this process so the chicken will stay crispy.

Serve immediately! It's great with rice.

Sprinkle sesame as desired.


Xaio Wan's General Tso's Chicken is not too greasy, sweet, or salty! You will enjoy this if the traditional General Tso's Chicken is too strong for your tastes. Xiao Wan's version is refreshing and flavorful.