Korea - Dakgangjeong

Last recipe from Korea today so we're finishing on this Korean popcorn chicken that's served as street food pretty commonly. The kids are already fans of American style popcorn chicken so let's see what they think of the Korean version.

Ingredients: 

Chicken

• 2 packs of 500g chicken breasts
• 1 tbsp rice wine
• 2 tsp ginger powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp black pepper
• 1 cup cornflour
• Some cooking oil for deep frying

Sauce

• 5 tbsp tomato sauce
• 1 & 1/2 tbsp chilli paste
• 2 tbsp honey
• 2 tbsp dark brown sugar
• 1 tbsp soy sauce
• 2 tsp oil
• 1/2 tsp garlic granules

 

Cut the chicken into bite sized pieces and place in a bowl. Add the ginger powder, rice wine, salt and pepper. I got my hands in there and rubbed it all into the chicken but you can stir it if you don't like touching raw meat.

Cover and put in the fridge for a couple of hours. When the time is almost up you can make the sauce by stirring together all the sauce ingredients. It's that easy.

Heat some oil in a frying pan for frying the chicken. Remove it from the fridge and add the cornflour. Making sure each piece is coated well. Fry the chicken in batches, draining on kitchen paper when it's done.

In another frying pan heat up the sauce and as it starts to bubble, add the fried chicken. Stir well so the chicken is coated by the sauce. The sauce will thicken and turn sticky. Then it's ready to serve. Garnish with some sesame seeds if you like or some chopped spring onions.

We really enjoyed Korean popcorn chicken. I think it's much nicer than American style popcorn chicken but the kids didn't agree. It was warmingly spicy and the sauce was perfectly covering every bit of chicken. It'd be nice with rice to balance out the chili heat but I'd decided to serve it alone street food style as it's mostly eaten that way in Korea (vendors sell it in a paper cup with a wooden fork or toothpick to eat it with). Either way, it's delicious! :)