Sweet and Sour Chicken

Submitted by Becky in Southeaste

"My mom used to make this when I was younger -- it was always a family favorite. Now, I make it for my boyfriend; he enjoys it better than the Chinese Restaurant versions. Be sure to season the chicken overnight -- it gives the chicken all its flavor."

 

• Ready In: 25hrs
• Ingredients: 14
• Serves: 6-8

ingredients

• 5 whole skinless chicken breasts, cut into chunks

• Batter

• 3 -5 eggs
• 1 1⁄2 - 3 1⁄2 cups flour
• 3⁄4 - 1 1⁄4 cup water
• 3 -4 teaspoons salt
• 4 1⁄2 teaspoons baking powder

• Sauce

• 1 (20 ounce) can pineapple chunks, in natural juice
• 1 large green pepper, cubed
• 1⁄2 cup vinegar
• 1⁄2 cup brown sugar
• 2 teaspoons molasses
• maraschino cherry

• Thickening

• 1⁄4 cup water
• 2 tablespoons cornstarch

directions

1. Season chicken chunks with salt, pepper, and garlic powder.
2. Refrigerate overnight.
3. Heat oil in an electric frying pan or deep fryer.
4. Mix batter ingredients until smooth.
5. Mix bite-size pieces of meat with batter.
6. Deep fry batter covered meat until golden brown (make sure the chicken is cooked thoroughly).
7. Drain chicken pieces on a paper towel.
8. Place cooked chicken in a low heat oven, while other chicken is being cooked.
9. In a bowl, mix pineapple juice, vinegar, brown sugar& molasses.
10. Place mixture, along with pineapples, peppers, and cherries, into a sauce pan and bring to a boil.
11. In a separate dish, mix together thickening ingredients.
12. Add to saucepan.
13. Stir and cook until glossy.

Reviews

[Ashley L.]

Chicken and batter recipe were outstanding. The sweet and sour recipe was a little too sweet. Next time I will use about half a jar of cherry juice (I didn't put any actual cherries in the sauce).

 

[sweet n delicious]

i loved it and so did my mom and she's really picky cuz she doesn't like sweet stuff... but i took out the green peppers didn't really like the taste with it

 

[Buckeye Mom]

This was great!! I was asked by my teenage stepson to find a recipe for Sweet and Sour Chicken. I followed the recipe to a T! We had WAY too much chicken compared to sauce so I just whipped up another batch of sauce the next night a voila..just as good as the night before! I had to add some extra thickener, but other than that..I wouldn't change a thing!!

 

[DogAndCatDoc]

What a delicious dish! I actually am reviewing the sauce more so than the chicken, as I used Mean Chef's recipe for her general tso's chicken for that portion...which worked wonderfully...then I made the sauce using this recipe. I tripled the amounts as I was cooking for a group. I used tarragon vinegar....1 cup, 1 1/2 cups brown sugar, 1 cup pineapple juice, chopped red, yellow and orange bell peppers, pinneaple chunks, onions cut in large sections, 1.5 tablespoons molasses, and then because I did not have maraschino cherries I put in 1.5-2 tsp of almond extract. then for the remainder of the liquid I used 1.5 cups water with about 2 tsp of organic orange oil. This was fabulous! All guests said it was better than anything they have ever had in even their favorite chinese restaurants! Compliments to the chef. Even though I changed the recipe quite a bit, I never would have thought of the idea of molasses and maraschino flavors. thanks so much! 10 star recipe!

 

[Lynne78]

Absolutely brilliant recipe! I fed three people with quite substantial portions, but was unsure intially about how much flour and how many eggs to use for the batter. I found that 2.5 cups of plain flour, 3 teaspoons of baking soda and 3 eggs was more than enough to coat 22 pieces of chicken (5 breasts cut up into smaller pieces). However, I didn't coat the chicken with batter when it was raw. I cooked the chicken in the oven for 30 mins on gas mark 5 (All individually wrapped in tin foil) and then allowed it to cool. This ensured the chicken would be cooked thoroughly. One final thing: I used golden syrup in place of the molasses (I understand molasses is a dark treacle) and I added three heaped tablespoons of shredless orange marmalade. The sauce was superb. Many thanks again for the recipe. It was a real hit with my family! ;)