La Zi Ji

Making La Zi Ji

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1. Mix the chicken with the wine, soy sauce, salt, white pepper and egg white and leave 20 minutes.

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2. Toss the chicken in the cornflour until every piece is coated, shaking off the excess.

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3. Heat the oil to 160°C / 320°F and fry the chicken in batches 4 minutes, until pale gold. Lift out onto a rack.

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4. Raise the oil to 190°C / 375°F and fry the chicken again, in batches, 90 seconds, until deep gold and crisp. Drain.

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5. Pour off all but 4 tbsp of the oil.

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6. Over medium heat, add the dried chillies and Sichuan peppercorns and toast 60 seconds, until fragrant and a shade darker. Take the pan off the heat if they threaten to blacken.

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7. Add the garlic and ginger for 30 seconds.

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8. Return the chicken, add the sugar and salt, and toss hard over high heat 1 minute.

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9. Finish with the sesame oil, sesame seeds and spring onions. Serve, and eat around the chillies.

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Related guide: Prep, cook and total time.

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Small Things That Help

• Pull the pan the second the chillies darken. Burnt chillies are unfixable.
• Fry twice — 160°C / 320°F then 190°C / 375°F.
• Whole chillies, not flakes. It is aroma, not raw heat.

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 red chillies. 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.

What Goes With La Zi Ji

• Steamed rice
• A cold beer
• Something cooling alongside

Sides from the same cuisine on this site: Vegan Fried Rice.

Leftovers and Storage

Best immediately. Refrigerated 2 days and re-crisped in a hot oven.

La Zi Ji: Questions and Answers

What's in a Serving

No nutrition figures are given for this recipe: they cannot be worked out reliably from its ingredient list (how much frying oil the food takes up cannot be known from the recipe). Why some recipes have none.

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