Name: Sichuanese Chicken Thighs with an Exotic Sauce
Yield: Serves 8 with 4 Other Dishes
Cuisine: Sichuanese
Ingredients: 18 chicken thighs, about 675 g (1½ lb), skinned and boned; 30 ml (2 tbsp) thick or dark soy sauce; 15 ml (1 tbsp) Chinese rice vinegar; 7.5 ml (1½ tsp) sugar; 5 ml (1 tsp) roasted ground Sichuan peppercorns; 30 ml (2 tbsp) sesame paste; 7.5 ml (1½ tsp) broadbean paste or hot bean paste; 15 ml (1 tbsp) sesame oil; 10 ml (2 tsp) finely chopped ginger; 7.5 ml (1½ tsp) finely chopped garlic; 60 ml (4 tbsp) peanut or vegetable oil; 50 ml (2 fl oz/¼ cup) chicken stock; 30 ml (2 tbsp) Shaoxing wine or medium dry sherry; 6 large spring onions, white parts only, trimmed and cut diagonally into sections; 50–115 g (2–4 oz/½–1 cup) roasted peanuts; 7.5 ml (1½ tsp) tapioca or potato flour dissolved in 15 ml (1 tbsp) water

Preparation info

Serves
8
with 4 Other Dishes

Difficulty
Medium

Appears in

Classic Food of China

By Yan-Kit So

Published 1992

About

One would expect this dish to be Sichuanese, for the ingredients that make up the sauce call for almost every Chinese condiment in your cupboard. The reward is a range of exotic flavours which assault your tastebuds in sequence, and you are at once surprised and delighted by them.

Dark, rather than white, chicken meat is used because it stands up to the intensity of the sauce so much better.