Chicken and Cashew Nut Stir-Fry
The list of ingredients isn't extensive, but the flavours from the few ingredients is amazing!
Ingredients
For the chicken (see Ching-He's Tips):
- 1 egg (see Notes)
- 1 tbsp cornflour
- a pinch of sea salt
- 500g skinless chicken breasts thinly sliced
- 300ml groundnut oil
For the stir-fry:
- 1 onion sliced
- 1 yellow pepper de-seeded, sliced into strips
- 3 tbsp chicken stock
- 1 carrot, peeled and sliced julienne (see Notes)
- 1 red pepper de-seeded, sliced into strips
- 2 to 3 tbsp light soy sauce
- 2 large spring onions sliced
- 4 tbsp roasted cashew nuts or toast in a pan
- sea salt and ground white pepper
- steamed jasmine rice to serve
Instructions
- Place the egg into a bowl, add the cornflour and a pinch of salt and whisk well to combine. Add the chicken to the mixture and coat well.
- Heat a wok over a high heat until it’s smoking and add the groundnut oil. Fry the chicken for 4 to 5 minutes, or until golden-brown and crisp, then remove with a slotted spoon and drain on kitchen roll.
- Then, pour off all the oil from the wok, except for one tbsp. Reheat the oil over a high heat, add the onion and stir-fry for a few seconds. Add the yellow and red pepper slices, and carrot and stir-fry for 1 minute, or until softened. Add the chicken pieces and stir-fry for 1 minute, then add the stock and soy sauce. Simmer for another minute, or until the chicken is cooked through.
- Stir in the spring onions and cashew nuts, season, to taste, with sea salt and ground white pepper and transfer to a serving dish. Serve immediately with steamed jasmine rice.
Notes
- In the recipe book, Ching-He lists 1 egg white in the ingredients list, however, on the BBC food website, it’s 1 egg. I make it with the whole egg to save wasting the yolk. Give it a try either way if you like.
- To add a bit more vegetable and extra colour, I add a carrot to the recipe - feel free to leave it out or add any other extra vegetables you like.
- The link to our steamed jasmine rice and a few other Chinese dishes are within the links below.
Ching-He's Tips
Ching-He provides a couple of tips within the recipe book:- The secret to making the chicken extra tasty is to coat it in egg white and cornflour and the shallow-fry it to give it a crispy coating. However, if you pushed for time, just add the raw chicken after the onion in the stir-fry and fry until it turns opaque, and then add the rest of the ingredients. So no need for the egg or cornflour, and only one tbsp groundnut oil needed.
- For an alternative, add some egg noodles with the cashew nuts in step 4 and mix through for a chicken and cashew nut chow mein.