Cantonese Crispy Fried Chicken
Difficulty 4/5 Ingredients 12 Steps 18
Crispy fried chicken is a Hong Kong/Cantonese specialty.
Ingredients
Pepper salt
- 1 Tbsp salt
- 3 Tbsp Sichuan peppercorns (花椒)
- 1 Tbsp ajinomoto seasoning (味の素)
Chicken
- 1 whole chicken (small)
- 2 Tbsp Chinese five-spice powder (五香粉)
- 3 slices of ginger, crushed
- 2 scallions
- Water to poach chicken in
Glaze
- 3 Tbsp vinegar
- ¼ cup sugar
For Frying
- 4 cups oil (or enough for deep fryer)
- Prawn crackers/shrimp chips (not the ready made ones)
Steps
Pepper salt
- Put salt and peppercorns in small pan. Heat on medium to low until it barely smokes.
- Remove from heat.
- Grind well in mortar and pestle, or with rolling pin.
- Add ajinomoto. Mix well.
Poaching
- Clean and rinse chicken. Discard giblets.
- Boil enough water to cover chicken in a pot.
- Tie five-spice powder, ginger and scallions in a cloth. Add to water and simmer 15 minutes.
- Add chicken. Reduce heat and poach 20 minutes.
- Remove from heat. Pat dry with paper towels and air dry briefly.
- Heat vinegar and sugar in saucepan until dissolved into syrup.
- Coat chicken inside and outside with syrup.
- Dry in a breeze until very dry.
Frying
- Heat oil in deep fryer to 350°F (175°C).
- Deep fry chicken about 10 minutes per side until brown and done.
- Remove from oil. Chop with cleaver into 1 x 2-inch pieces.
- Fry shrimp chips in deep fryer.
- Sprinkle shrimp chips with a little salt.
- Serve chicken with shrimp chips and pepper salt in a small dish.
Notes from the original
- Poaching is not the same as boiling, since the temperature is lower, about 160 - instead of at 212 F, and is even lower than simmering. If boiled, the meat will come out tough and dry. Also the lower the poaching temperature, the longer it will take to poach.
- Drying the skin is important, since it helps the syrup to stick. The second drying also is important, since that is what helps to make skin crispy. It can be done the day before, and the chicken kept in the fridge.
- The caramelized sugar gives the nice brown color. Vinegar lowers the pH, and helps the caramelization.
- Oil temperature is important, since it imparts the brown color to the skin. If the oil temperature is too low, the sugar will not caramelize, and the chicken will not be brown. If it is too high, the sugar will burn. If you don't have a temperature controlled fryer, use a frying (or candy) thermometer.
- A deep fryer can hold 2 or 3 liters of oil. Use as much as your deep fryer manual dictates.
- If you don't have a deep fryer, it can be fried on the stove in a pot or wok with a fry thermometer, but be very careful. WARNING: A wok can easily tip, spilling oil and giving severe burns. If the oil overflows, one can easily have a very dangerous oil fire. Please read warnings in the article on Cookbook:Deep Fat Frying
Source. Adapted from “Cookbook:Cantonese Crispy Fried Chicken” by Wikibooks contributors, revision of 2025-06-11, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Changes. Steps rewritten into short commands. Introduction shortened. Wiki formatting removed. This adapted recipe is shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Photo. Crispyfriedchicken.jpg by tissue_fleur, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia. Resized; otherwise unchanged.