General Tso's Chicken

There are several stories concerning the origin of the dish. Eileen Yin-Fei Lo states in her book The Chinese Kitchen that the dish originates from a simple Hunan chicken dish and that the reference to "Zongtang" was not a reference to Zuo Zongtang's given name, but rather a reference to the homonym "zongtang", meaning "ancestral meeting hall". Consistent with this interpretation, the dish name is sometimes found in Chinese as "Zuo ancestral hall chicken" (Chung tong gai is a transliteration of "ancestral meeting hall chicken" from Cantonese; Zuǒ Zōngtáng jī is the standard name of General Tso's chicken as transliterated from Mandarin).


Ingredients:

To marinade the chicken

• 1 kg chicken in cubes of 2 cm
• 2 tbsp of light soya sauce
• 1 tsp of freshly grounded black pepper
• 1 egg, beaten
• 3 tbps of corn starch
• 1 cup of flower

For the sauce

• 2 tbsp of dark soya sauce
• 2 tbsp of oyster sauce
• 1 tsp of sesame oil
• 2 tbsp of rice vinegar or balsemic vinegar
• 1 tbsp of rice wine
• 2 tbsp of caster sugar
• 1 cup of chicken or vegetable stock
• 1 tbsp of corn starch
• 1 tbsp of garlic (finely cut)
• 1 tbsp of ginger (finely cut)
• 1 tbsp of oil

For the stir fry basics

• 2 tbsp of oil
• 1 onion
• 5 dried red chilli peppers (crunched)

For the stir fry chicken

• 6 cups of oil

For the finishing touch

• sesame seeds
• spring onions

step 1:

Take a bowl and mix the soya sauce and the ground pepper with the chicken cubes.

Add the clutched egg and the corn starch.

Step 2:

Take another bowl and mix the ingredients for the sauce, except the garlic, ginger and onion.

Step 3:

Take a large wok and heat the oil. Take a large plate and add the flower. Cover the pieces of chicken and shake of the dust, Then fry the pieces in the heated oil untill light brown. Put them in a few pieces by a few pieces, so they can swim and float. Set them apart.

Step 3:

Put the 2/3 of the heated oil form the heated wok add the onion and stirr fry for one minute. Add the garlic and ginger and fry for 30 seconds. Add the sauce and cook it for a few minutes. Keep it at the syrupy constistancy, maybe you need to add some water.

Then cover the chicken pieces by mixing with the cooked sauce.

Step 4:

Serve on a plate with white rice and add some toasted sesameseeds and springonions. And ENJOY!