Sweet and Sour Chicken

Sweet and Sour Chicken

Recently, my son’s kindergarten teacher asked me if I cooked sweet and sour chicken at home. At first blush, I thought she was asking me (you know, the only Asian mother at a very traditional Swiss school) for a recipe.

But it transpired that the cook had prepared sweet and sour chicken for the childrens’ lunch earlier that day, and my son was the only child who happily ate his meal, plus an extra portion. I am most proud of my son when I hear that he has eaten well!

Sweet and Sour Chicken Recipe

But to answer the teacher’s question, I do in fact make sweet and sour chicken at home. A lot. I know it might not be the healthiest of meals, but it is one of the tastiest ways I know of eating a lot of vegetables.

This is actually a recipe I turn to often when I have odd bits of leftover vegetables in the fridge which need using up.

If I am not making my favourite Thai curry or Japanese curry with those vegetables, a sweet and sour sauce is something I can always whip up quickly using ingredients already in the fridge and pantry.

How to Make Sweet and Sour Chicken

I like to make the Sweet and Sour Sauce with lots of vegetables and serve this alongside the fried chicken, rather than mixing the two together. This way, the chicken stays crispy for longer, and any leftovers can be stored separately for easier reheating later.

Most Chinese restaurants serve Sweet and Sour Chicken where the chicken has been coated in a thick batter and deep-fried. Whilst this is a delicious way to make fried chicken, this method takes more time and effort at home.

When making fried chicken at home for a dish such as Sweet and Sour Chicken, I rely on my trusty recipe for Japanese Fried Chicken, which I use to serve in a variety of ways. Instead of coating the chicken in a batter, the chicken pieces are instead dusted in flour to give a crispy coating.

Sweet and Sour Sauce

The recipe below is essentially for Sweet and Sour Vegetables, to which you can add your favourite vegetables. It is a vegetable sauce which I frequently make to use up leftover vegetables in my fridge which need using up – somehow, they always taste great together in a Sweet and Sour Sauce.

Freezer Tip

This Sweet and Sour Sauce freezes well, but not all vegetables freeze well. If I plan on making this sauce to store in the freezer, I generally don’t add any vegetables (aside from the onions and carrots at the start, which taste fine once defrosted).

Sometimes I will double or triple the recipe for the Sweet and Sour Sauce, but once I have added all of the sauce ingredients and thickened it with the cornflour slurry, I will set aside some of the sauce for freezing once cooled, and I will continue cooking with the rest of the sauce for dinner that night.

Upon defrosting the sauce, you can add fresh vegetables to the sauce once it has come to a simmer on the stove.

Variations

It goes without saying that you can also use whatever vegetables you like. Crunchy vegetables work best in this recipe, such as:

• capsicums (bell peppers)
• carrots
• celery
• green beans

But as this is a recipe I frequently use to empty the vegetable drawers in the fridge, it also tastes great with:

• bean sprouts
• broccoli
• cauliflower
• courgette (zucchini)
• cucumber
• tomatoes

I sometimes also add frozen peas if I think the dish needs a bit of colour. But what I always, always, add is pineapple; fresh is always better, but I admit to keeping small cans of diced pineapple in the pantry just for this recipe.

What to Serve with Sweet and Sour Sauce

We love to serve sweet and sour chicken with steamed Jasmine rice, which means making a lot of sauce to drizzle over the rice. But, as always, you can customise the dish to your liking and make less sauce.

There’s no need to order Chinese takeaway anymore!

Update

This recipe was first published on 10 November 2017. It has been updated with more comprehensive recipe notes.