Healthy Baked Taiwanese Popcorn Chicken

Apr 16

Apr 16 Healthy[er] Taiwanese Popcorn Chicken

I try to shy away from fried foods because once I start, I can't stop. Recently, when getting bubble tea, I decided to get some popcorn chicken. Big mistake. Over the next week, this chicken began invading my thoughts. How can I make it less unhealthy? Is it possible to bake the chicken and imitate the crispiness of deep fried chicken? So after trial and error, here's my recipe for Taiwanese popcorn chicken that tastes just as good as the real thing, but without all that oil!

Ingredients:

Marinade

2 Garlic cloves
2 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp five spice powder
1 tap Japanese mixed chili powder- seriously trust me. This makes the chicken so magically spicy that you have to chase it with boba
1/2 tsp sesame oil
1/2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
1/8 tsp black pepper powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/8 tsp sugar

Other

2 large eggs

1/2 teaspoon coarse salt
2 cups fine Bread Crumbs - I make my own with Semifreddi's seeded sourdough. baguette. This is what MAKES the chicken bomb. Make sure you wait till the baguette hardens before you turn it into bread crumbs
Panko bread crumbs
5 spice powder and Japanese chili powder for taste
1 tsp of anise
Boneless Chicken Thighs (approximately 1 1/2 pound), boneless and skinless* Make sure you use dark meat NOT breasts.
Jasmine rice (1 cup)

Instructions:

Marinate chicken with spice powder, anise, minced garlic, teaspoon salt, and 2 green onions for 3 hours.

Take Semifreddi's baguette and grunt up into bread crumbs in any old mixer. I use the Bella blender, which is super cheap and super effective.

Preheat oven to 450 degrees F.

Put 1 cup of rice in the rice cooker with 2 cups of water & cook. Or cook over stove.

In a bowl, mix crack and mix 2 eggs until the York and white are mixed. In another plate, place a add a 1:1 ratio of breadcrumbs to panko (you'll near quite a bit).

Remove excesss marinade from bowl. Cut the chicken into approximately 1-inch cubes.

Dip chicken in egg mixture to coat and toss around in bread crumb plate until coated.

Place chicken on baking sheet. Make sure there's space between the chicken pieces.

Bake for 14 minutes.

Add additional five spice powder or Japanese chili powder and enjoy!

This recipe goes fantastically with boba--