Name: Five-Fragrance Deep-Fried Chicken (炸子鷄)
Yield: As a main course, it would serve 3 or 4 with a light stir-fried vegetable.
Cuisine: Chinese
Ingredients: 1 teaspoon five-fragrance powder; Roasted salt-pepper; 4 cups oil; 3 tablespoons light soy sauce; 1 tablespoon dark soy sauce; 1 egg white; 1 frying chicken, about 2½ pounds, chopped; 1 heaping tablespoon cornstarch; 1 tablespoon dry sherry; ½ teaspoon sugar

Preparation info

As a main course, it would serve
3 or 4
with a light stir-fried vegetable.

Difficulty
Easy

Appears in

The Key to Chinese Cooking

By Irene Kuo

Published 1977

About

This recipe is one of the best examples of regular deep-frying, showing the bone-in chunk cutting, the marinating, and the double-frying procedure. The chicken is dark in color and smells and tastes wonderfully of anise. It is delicious hot, at room temperature, or cold.

Ingredients

1 frying chicken, about 2½ pounds, chopped
4 cups oil

Method

Chopping the Vhicken Through the Bones

This is the classic bone-chopping method for a whole chicken. Rinse and dry the chicken thoroughly; discard the tail and the fat from the cavity. Disjoint the chicken at the shoulders and thighs. Cut off and discard the wing tips; then chop each wing into 3 pieces, leaving the joint intact. Chop each whole leg into 5 pieces—twice across the thigh