Some like it HOT!
Back in May we were in Austin to babysit the new grandson, Frankie and his brother, Thomas, while his parents went to a Derby party one night and a wedding the next night. It easy taking care of a two month old because he couldn’t crawl and get into stuff or get up and run all over the house with Gran tailing him to make sure he didn’t get hurt. All Frankie did was lay there and look cute while his big brother did all the other stuff.
One night we ordered Chinese and our SIL told us about one of his favorites from this restaurant which was fried chicken (a lot smaller than I made mine), breaded, fried and then covered with these fried hot pepper pieces. He warned us that it was almost 50/50 ratio of chicken vs hot peppers. The pepper wasn’t crushed red pepper but the whole dried peppers you buy in the produce section and then broken up into small chunks. At first we thought we were just eating chicken skin because the pieces were so tiny but soon realized that it was indeed chicken pieces with skin cut into tiny pieces maybe 1/2″ thin pieces and fried until crisp and then heaped high with hot peppers.
Hot and spicy food of any kind is our favorite, but I have to admit that I was scraping off some of the pepper. So if you don’t like really spicy things, just cut back some on the peppers. I served this on top of my Lemon Parsley Rice that’s made with cauliflower and white rice.
I found this recipe at To Food With Love. com and she described it to a tee when she said tongue-numbing, fragrant and delicious; be adventurous and give this a try. The second time I made this recipe I added the sauce because I thought it needed something to moisten the dish.
BLAST FROM THE PAST: These little Smoked Salmon Stacks make a good gluten free appetizer for the summer months.
This recipe called for potato flour because it was gluten-free but you could substitute with either flour or cornstarch.
Thinly slice the green onions and refrigerate until ready to use them.
Break the dried red peppers into small pieces and use seeds and the pepper.
Toast the peppercorns for a few minutes until they start to pop and smell fragrant.
I used a mortar and pestle to crush the Sichuan peppercorns; if you don’t have one use a hammer.
Cut the chicken into small pieces, the smaller the better.
Put the chicken into a dish and toss with the seasoning.
Toss the chicken pieces with the potato flour (or regular flour or cornstarch).
Heat a skillet, add oil and heat until hot. Fry the chicken pieces into brown and done. Won’t take long since the chicken is cut into small pieces.
Add in the sautéed peppers and toss.
Serve the chicken on top of white rice. Add some soy sauce if you want or I have given you an extra sauce you may want to try. I think if you had some sweet and sour sauce in the refrigerator, warm it up and give it a try also.
Top with some of the green onions and I also used some sesame seeds the second time I made this recipe.
- 1 lb.chicken breast fillets, diced into 1/2 inch cubes
- 1/4 cup potato flour (or all-purpose)
- Salt, pepper, light soy sauce
- 1 tbsp chopped garlic
- 2 tsp minced ginger
- 1/2 cup chopped spring onions
- 1 cup (or more if you wish) dried red chillies, cut in half (do not discard the seeds)
- 1 Tbsp. oyster sauce
- 2 Tbsp. Chinese cooking wine
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1 tsp Sichuan peppercorns, toasted and finely ground
- 1/2 tsp sugar (optional)
- Additional Sauce: (optional)
- 2 tablespoons soy sauce
- 1 tablespoon Chinese rice vinegar or apple cider vinegar
- 4 tablespoons sugar
- 2 teaspoons cornstarch
- 1/3 cup (80 ml) tablespoons water
- juice of 1/2 lemon
- Combine chicken with marinade and leave for an hour or so. Coat chicken pieces evenly in potato flour and deep fry till cooked (about 1-2 minutes). Drain and put aside.
- Heat up 1 tbsp peanut oil in a wok. Fry garlic and ginger for a minute till fragrant, then add chillies (with seeds), oyster sauce and wine. Fry for 1-2 minutes, then add chicken, spring onions, salt and Sichuan pepper (sugar optional). Toss for a minute until evenly coated and transfer to a plate. Serve immediately.
- For the additional sauce, mix all ingredients and drizzle over each plate.
- I served mine on top of some cauliflower/rice made with cauliflower and long grain rice. If you don't like really spicy cut back on the red peppers and you could always add in some red bell pepper cut in slivers.
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