Taiwanese Popcorn Chicken
台式盐酥鸡
Crispy bite-sized chicken pieces seasoned with five-spice and fried with fragrant basil leaves. Taiwan's iconic street snack featuring golden, crunchy coating and tender, juicy chicken within.
Servings
2-3 people
Prep Time
45 minutes
Cook Time
15 minutes
Spice Level
Mild
Ingredients
Instructions
Cut chicken breast into small pieces, add five spice powder, white pepper powder, minced garlic, rice wine, salt, soy sauce paste. Mix well and marinate for half an hour.
Add one beaten egg to the marinated chicken and mix well.
Meat mixed with egg will be softer and more tender when fried and easier to coat with flour.
Pour sweet potato starch into a small bowl, add chicken pieces, note to add only four or five pieces at a time to prevent sticking together.
Slowly shake the starch bowl like rolling tangyuan, let each chicken piece coat evenly with starch.
Arrange the coated chicken in a plate and let rest for five to ten minutes.
Let the coating absorb moisture so it won't fall off easily when frying.
Wash Thai basil clean then dry or air dry, pick off the leaves and set aside.
Heat oil in a pan, when oil is warm, add Thai basil first.
As oil temperature rises, the moisture in Thai basil leaves will be slowly fried dry by the oil.
When the leaves become dry and crispy, you can remove them.
After removing Thai basil, add the coated chicken pieces, fry chicken pieces until light yellow then remove, raise oil temperature to 180 degrees, pour into the pan and fry again until surface is golden brown then remove.
Pour in the previously fried Thai basil, sprinkle a little five spice powder on the surface and mix well with the chicken pieces.
- Five spice powder, soy sauce paste, sweet potato starch, and Thai basil are the soul of Taiwanese Popcorn Chicken and can be said to be indispensable. However, if you really can't buy soy sauce paste, you can also use soy sauce + oyster sauce as a substitute.
- Sweet potato starch is also called sweet potato flour, which is a coarse-grained starch, usually used as frying powder for fried chicken cutlets or chicken nuggets.
- For chicken, you can choose chicken breast or chicken leg meat. Chicken thigh meat is preferred as it turns out more tender and juicy when fried, and the meat is less likely to become dry and tough.
- If you like a more intense flavor, you can add a little five spice powder and pepper powder to the dry flour for extra taste.