Every weekend Kelly, Cliff and myself have a big cooking fest. Usually we end up with the most random selection of food. Often times we end up with 5 different desserts and no lunch or dinner. Two weekends ago we really had our act together though! We made three Chinese restaurant style recipes which we posted this week. Crab rangoon, eggrolls, and now sweet and sour chicken. Now you are ready to make the whole meal! We really love Chinese food, but we tend to order things like orange chicken or lemon chicken. Both of which are usually fried. In other words, not so healthy! I am not going to claim that this recipe is healthy. But it is healthier than the fried version. We also added vegetables in lieu of rice so that should add some nutrition.
When Kelly first suggested this recipe I immediately said no because Cliff will not go near anything that has ketchup in it. We decided to go ahead and do it anyway and just hope he didn’t notice the big bottle of ketchup in our “here is what you’ll need” picture. He is surprisingly observant though. At first he refused to eat it, but eventually he gave it a try. And he liked it!! We like extra sauce so we doubled the sauce portion of the recipe. The only thing we didn’t like was that the vinegar flavor was very strong. Next time we will not double the vinegar portion. I have reflected that in my ingredients below. Other than that we loved this chicken!! It was even better than the sweet and sour chicken you get at Chinese restaurants. This chicken has a nice crispy texture but is not fried, and the sauce goes great with the chicken and the vegetables.
Here is what you'll need
Cut the chicken in bite sized pieces and then sprinkle with salt and pepper
Whisk the egg
Coat the chicken in egg
Dredge the chicken in corn starch
Brown the chicken in a little bit of oil
Begin the sauce with sugar
Add ketchup
Soy Sauce
Vinegar
And garlic powder
Mix well
Transfer the browned chicken to a baking sheet and coat with half of the sauce
Cook the chicken for about 45 minutes flipping every 15
Meanwhile, saute the vegetables
Simmer the remaining sauce in a pot for about 8 minutes until thickened, then coat the vegetables with the sauce
Add the cooked chicken to the vegetables and mix
Better than take out? I think so.
Ingredients
Chicken
3-4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
Salt and pepper
1 cup cornstarch
2 eggs, beaten
1/4 cup canola oil
Sauce
1 ½ cup sugar
8 tablespoons ketchup
½ cup cider vinegar
2 Tablespoon soy sauce
2 Tablespoons garlic powder
Vegetables
broccoli
carrots
pea-pods
water chestnuts
baby corn
canola oil
Note:
You can use any combination of vegetables you would like. You will want about 6 cups of vegetables.
Directions
Cut boneless chicken breasts into bite sized pieces; season with salt and pepper. Dredge the chicken in egg and then in cornstarch. Fry in a little oil until brown. The chicken does not need to be cooked through at this point. Place in a single layer on a baking sheet. Mix sauce ingredients together and pour ½ over chicken. Bake for about 45 minutes at 325 degrees. Turn chicken every 15 minutes so it is evenly coated with the sauce. While the chicken is cooking begin sautéing the vegetables with a little oil. Depending on what kind of vegetables you use it will take about 10 minutes. Bring the remaining sauce to a simmer in a small pot and let thicken about 8 minutes. Pour the sauce over the vegetables. You can then mix the vegetables with the chicken or serve them separately.
Source: Adapted from How Sweet it is
That looks very yummy!
It was excellent!
Love that it’s baked for the last half! And your pictures are gorgeous!
Thanks, I think Cliff is a pretty awesome photographer!
My goodness. This looks so much better than takeout! I will definitely be making this soon. Thank you for the great recipe and step by step. Big fan right here 🙂
Thanks!!
Fantastic! I love homemade Asian food.
Thanks, I hope you give it a try!!
Can’t wait to try this. My son is allergic to pineapple and haven’t been able to make my sweet & sour recipe, so I like that this uses sugar for the “sweet.”
It is really good, let us know what you think.
That looks so fantastic! Can’t wait to try it!
Thanks, we really enjoyed it!
your salt and pepper shakers are oh so cute
Thanks, they are pylones.
I found this recipe on Pinterest and made it tonight…its AWESOME!! I have 3 boys and they all loved it and my oldest even asked if I could make this again, that’s a BIG deal 🙂 I love your site and can’t wait to make more of your yummy recipes!
Thanks! I’m glad your kids liked it!
I made this for dinner last night and it was a hit! I LOVE chinese food, and this was super easy and delicious!
Although I have to admit that I made this with some store bought egg rolls, so next time I will definitely have to try your homemade egg roll recipe!
I am so glad you liked them! The egg rolls are nice because you can make a whole big batch, freeze them and use them whenever.
This looks fantastic. I definitely want to give this a try. I have a question, though. In the recipe, you say to use 2 teaspoons of garlic powder. But, in the picture, you’re using a tablespoon. Should I be using a teaspoon or a tablespoon?
You are right, it should be tablespoons. I have corrected it. Sorry for the confusion.
Thanks for clearing that up. I’m really excited to try this. It looks delicious! 🙂
Thanks for letting us know. I hope you like it!
Just made this and it was so good! Already can’t wait to eat leftovers for lunch tomorrow:-)
So glad you liked it!
I just made this and it was SO GOOD. It’s definitely going on my meal rotation!
p.s. I used the whole cup of vinegar and I don’t think it could have been any more perfect. 🙂
Found you guys on pinterest. Just cooked this tonight and it was so good! I will definitely cook this again.
Way too sweet! I like sweet foods and I thought this was too overwhelming. I would try and make it again, but with maybe half the sugar and maybe substitute something for the ketchup!
Megan, let me know what you think if you make it with half the sugar. Maybe you can use tomato paste instead of ketchup?
This sounds amazing. I am thinking about making this tomorrow but the only problem is I do not have any cider vinegar. I only have distilled white vinegar. Do you think this will be okay? Or should I get the cider? :))
I think you could use white vinegar. How about vinegar mixed with a little bit of apple juice?
This was GREAT! I made the sauce and microwaved it for a minute rather than baking the chicken with the sauce, and it was a superb dipping sauce. There wasn’t anything left! I’d even use the sauce as a salad dressing if I were to use bites of chicken on a salad. I shared this on my Foodies Haifa Facebook page (here in Israel) on facebook, and it’s gotten a lot of likes!