How to make Colm O'Gorman's sweet and sour chicken

"The marinade adds fabulous flavour to the dish and lifts it to another level."

My take on this Chinese takeaway classic uses fresh pineapple juice as a base for the sauce. 

Juicing a fresh pineapple is a little fiddly, but it is worth the effort.

Fresh pineapple juice has a better flavour than the shop bought variety, but if you want to save some time, you can use that instead. 

Just avoid sweetened pineapple juice and, if possible, try to find one that is not made from concentrate.

I marinate my chicken in ginger, garlic and some rice wine before coating it with cornflour.

If you cannot find rice wine, then sherry is a good substitute.

The marinade adds fabulous flavour to the dish and lifts it to another level.

I also twice fry the chicken to make it’s super crispy and toss it in the sauce just before I serve it to maintain that lovely crispy texture.

Sweet and Sour Chicken

recipe by:Colm O'Gorman

My take on this Chinese takeaway classic uses fresh pineapple juice as a base for the sauce.

Servings

4

Preparation Time

 30 mins

Cooking Time

 20 mins

Total Time

 50 mins

Course

 Main

Ingredients

• 400g chicken breast mini fillets

• 1-2 cloves garlic

• 2 tsp fresh grated ginger

• 2 tbsp rice wine or sherry

• 100g cornflour

• 1 medium-sized pineapple

• 100g soft light brown sugar

• 40ml tomato ketchup

• 30ml soy sauce

• 45ml apple cider vinegar

• 1 medium onion

• ½ red pepper

• ½ green pepper

• 2 tbsp sesame oil

• 1 litre sunflower oil

Method

1. Cut the chicken mini fillets in half lengthways to make thin strips of chicken, about 2cm thick is perfect. Peel and grate the ginger and garlic. Pop both into a bowl along with the chicken, rice wine or sherry, and one tablespoon of the cornflour. Stir well to combine. Set aside while you prepare the sweet and sour sauce.

2. Place the pineapple on its side on a chopping board. Using a sharp knife to slice off the crown, this includes the green leaves and about a centimetre of the top of the pineapple. Cut away the bottom of the pineapple and stand it upright on the chopping board. Use a sharp knife to carefully cut away the outer peel, from top to bottom, following the contours of the pineapple. Use a sharp knife to remove the eyes that remain in the fruit before removing the core. Cut the fruit into chunks.

3. Put two thirds of the fruit into a food processor or blender, setting aside the remaining third until later. Blitz the pineapple to a thick juice. Pass this juice through a sieve and you should end up with 250-300ml of frothy juice.

4. Pour the juice into a saucepan. Add the soft brown sugar, tomato ketchup, apple cider vinegar and the soy sauce. Stir over a high heat to bring to a soft boil. Reduce to a simmer and cook for about 20 minutes until the sauce reduces by a third of its volume.

5. Peel and cut the onion into chunky strips, about one centimetre thick. Wash and cut the red and green peppers into similar sized pieces. Chop the remaining pineapple into similar sized chunks. Set all three aside for now while you move on to fry the chicken.

6. Heat the sunflower oil in a large saucepan. While it is heating, coat the chicken in cornflour. Put the cornflour into a wide bowl and working in batches, drop in some of the marinated chicken strips. Toss the chicken in the cornflour, ensuring every piece is well coated. Gently shake off any excess cornflour and set the coated chicken aside in a single layer on a large plate. Repeat until all the chicken strips are coated in cornflour.

7. For maximum crispiness, fry the chicken twice. Use a thermometer to check the temperature of the oil and when it has reached 180 Celsius, give the chicken its first fry. It is important that the oil is this hot to ensure that the chicken fries perfectly and gets a lovely crispy coating. If the oil is not hot enough, the cornflour will fall away, the coating will be soggy, and the chicken will be undercooked.

8. Working in small batches to avoid crowding the pan, fry the chicken for one and a half minutes and then remove it from the pan with a slotted spoon. Drain it on some clean kitchen paper while you fry the next batch. I do my first fry in three batches, making sure that I bring the oil back up to 180 Celsius between batches as it will cool slightly while cooking the chicken.

9. When all the chicken has had its first fry, bring the oil back up to temperature again and add all the chicken to give it a second fry. If your pan is big enough, you can do the second fry in just one batch. Fry the chicken for another two minutes, then remove it from the oil and allow it to drain on fresh clean kitchen paper or a wire rack.

10. Heat two tablespoons of sesame or olive oil over a high heat in a wok. When the oil is good and hot, add the chopped onions and stir fry for two minutes. Add the peppers and pineapple and continue to stir fry for about five minutes until the peppers blister a little and the pineapple begins to caramelise. Take care not to overcook them, you want the vegetables to have a little colour but still retain some bite and crispness.

11. Check the sauce, it should have reduced to a nice consistency by now, but if it is a little too thin, mix a teaspoon of cornflour with a splash of water and stir that into the sauce. Simmer the sauce for five minutes to cook out the cornflour taste.

12. Pour the sauce into the wok and stir gently to coat the chicken and the stir-fried vegetables and pineapple. Serve immediately with some plain boiled rice.