Bang Bang Chicken
Poached chicken torn into shreds under a sesame and chilli sauce. Named for the stick used to beat the meat loose from the bone in Sichuan.
Photograph credit: Sichuan signature spicy bon bon chicken by Coolli22 · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons · this resized copy is shared under the same licence
Build the Meal Around Bang Bang Chicken
- Smashed cucumber
- Cold beer
- Steamed rice
How to Make Bang Bang Chicken
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Bring the water to the boil with the ginger, spring onion, wine and salt.
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Lower in the chicken, bring back to a bare simmer for 3 minutes, then cover and take the pan off the heat.
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Let the chicken poach in the cooling liquid for 25 minutes, until cooked through.
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Lift it out, cool it, and tear the meat along the grain into rough shreds with your fingers.
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Loosen the sesame paste with the 3 tbsp poaching liquid until it pours.
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Whisk in the chilli oil, soy sauce, vinegar, garlic, sugar, Sichuan pepper and sesame oil.
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Lay the cucumber on a plate, pile the shredded chicken over and pour the sauce across.
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Finish with coriander, spring onion, sesame seeds and crushed peanuts.
Related guide: Prep, cook and total time.
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A Few Notes
Tear the chicken, never slice it.
Off the heat and covered. Simmering dries the breast out.
Loosen the sesame paste with the poaching liquid, not water.
Changing the Recipe
- Out of spring onions? A small regular onion, finely sliced, or a few chives stirred in at the end both cover the job.
- Dried chilli flakes can stand in for the chilli. Heat varies a great deal between chillies and between jars, so start with a small pinch and add more to taste.
- If you only have ground ginger, a quarter-teaspoon for each tablespoon of fresh is the ratio usually given; it tastes warmer and less bright than the fresh root.
Keeping What's Left
Refrigerated for 2 days, chicken and sauce kept separately.
Questions and Answers
How long does Bang Bang Chicken take to make?
20 minutes of preparation and 25 minutes of cooking, plus 25 minutes of cooling, so allow 1 hour 10 minutes from start to finish. The recipe serves 4.
Bang Bang Chicken Nutrition
No nutrition figures are given for this recipe: they cannot be worked out reliably from its ingredient list (some ingredient lines cannot be read). Why some recipes have none.
Your notes on this recipe
Cooked this? Keep a note for next time
Compiled by Turab
Checked by script for timings, diet labels and nutrition arithmetic. How the recipes are checked. Found a mistake? Tell us.
First published ; last changed .
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