Before I get too far, let me explain what I mean by “Mandarin Chicken”.
In New Orleans-area Chinese restaurants, there is invariably a staple dish on the menu called Mandarin Chicken. It consists of breaded-and-fried strips of boneless chicken covered in a thick, tannish-brown “peanutty” sauce – all served up on a bed of lettuce with steamed rice on the side.
That’s essentially it. Variations may include coarsely-ground peanuts in the sauce; or a sprinkling of ground peanuts, shaved almonds, or chopped scallions over the finished dish.
Now here’s the tricky part. Upon searching the Web for a version of this recipe, I found that 99% of the “Mandarin Chicken” recipes I could find contained orange slices, or pineapple, or strained apricots. This leads me to believe that this dish may be known by another name in other parts of the U.S.
So anyway – does anyone know what I’m talking about? And how one might make it at home? Making the sauce seems to be the key. Also, I’d be interested to know how to make the breading and if any special ingredients go into the dredge besides egg.
borderlond, the Mandarin sauce I am familiar with is a garlicky light red and mildly hot sort of cross between plum and hoisin sauce. I’m still trying to duplicate the Mandarin prawns recipe served at Koong’s Chinese restaurant in Milpitas, California.
I need a more exacting description of the sauce you’ve been had before I’ll be able to help you a lot. In the mean time, I’ll direct you to a recipe that sounds like the one I’ve had (and is incredibly delicious). Here is the list of ingredients and a link
Ingredients:
4 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
1 tablespoon sesame oil
½ cup chicken broth
2 tablespoons rice vinegar
1 tablespoon honey
6 small jellybeans
¼ teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
1 clove garlic, minced
½ teaspoon minced fresh ginger root
2 tablespoons sliced almonds
2 tablespoons minced green onions
1 teaspoon fresh cilantro sprigs, for garnish
(Fear not, the jelly beans are removed at a later time. I believe they are added for some pectin.)
This recipe seems to have the basic components of the sauce I’ve had. It includes the sliced almonds you mentioned to as well. The breading you refer to is more likely a “silking” or “velvet” technique I’ve posted elsewhere. I’ll include it here for your perusal.
How To “Silk” Meats:
The process of “silking” meats gives them a slightly crunchy and chewy texture similar to what you have on your sweet and sour type dishes. Frying with peanut oil is best due to its high smoking temperature and clean flavor.[ul][li] For every pound of meat use two egg whites and ¼ cup cornstarch.[/li]
[li] Cut the meat into bite size chunks.[/li]
[li] Place the cornstarch and meat in a bag.[/li]
[li] Shake until completely coated.[/li]
[li] For the best results hand dredge each piece [/li](very time consuming).
[li] Beat the egg whites in a medium size bowl.[/li]
[li] Add the meat slowly and stir.[/li]
[li] Make sure that all the meat is coated with egg white.[/li]
[li] Let the coated meat rest for at least 15 minutes.[/li]
[li] Heat the peanut oil very hot.[/li]
[li] When frying the meat, add to the oil slowly to prevent cooling.[/li]
[li] Meat is done when a crisp coating is obtained.[/li]
[li] Drain on paper towels and then combine with sauce.[/li]
[li] Serve immediately.[/ul][/li]
Feel free to post any questions or clarifications. I’ll do my best to help you recreate the dish. Let me know how the recipe I listed above compares to the one you had.
Thanks, Zenster. I ran into a few recipes for Mandarin Chicken that involved jelly beans. I also saw some references to hoisin sauce. BTW … what all is in hoisin sauce? Maybe that’s a key.
I think what I’m going to do is talk to the folks who run the Chinese restaurant across the street. That place is the only Chinese restaurant I’ve found in the Jackson, MS area that makes New Orleans-style Mandarin Chicken – and it’s not even on the menu! You have to know to ask for it.
The proprietors are pretty cool, and I can chat with them about their Mandarin Chicken sauce ingredients. Once I have a list of ingredients in hand, I’ll post them back here.
You can also velvet using boiling water instead of oil. it will get you the separation of taste and texture between the meat and the sauce/veggies just the same. Easier cleanup, easier on your cholesterol
My technique is from Ken Hom’s Easy Family Recipes from a Chinese=American Childhood. I love this book, it has wonderful dishes which are easy to prepare, concisely explained, and look and taste like Chinatown.
Water or oil Velvet:
Per lb of meat (this is almost exclusively done with chicken, shrimp, and some seafood; I have never seen beef prepared this way)
mix together in a bowl:
1 egg white
1 tsp kosher salt
2 tsp cornstarch
Mix pieces thouroghly, and refriegerate for 1/2 hour.
Where Zenster and I differ in this is that I only cook the pieces in the oil or the boiling water until they turn white.
The only times I have seen recipes call for it to be cooked till brown is when
1 tsp Shaoxing rice wine/dry sherry
1 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp light soy ( NOT NOT NOT “Lite”, but lighter soy sauce, you should be able to get at an Asian grocery)
are added to the velveting mixture.
I prefer my way as it allows the food to cook a bit longer with the rest of the ingredients and gives you more chance to avoid overcooking the meat.
OK, went to the neighborhood Chinese place last night, and inquired about their Mandarin Chicken sauce.
It seems that the sauce consists of beef broth (!), oil (almost certainly peanut oil), and cornstarch. A little water may be added now and then if the sauce needs to be thinned out a tad. I got the impression that the chef may have left out a secret ingredient or two, but I was assured that the sauce contained neither ground peanuts nor peanut butter.
Their Mandarin Chicken sauce looks almost exactly like regular ol’ brown gravy Americans commonly put on, say, mashed potatoes. The Mandarin Chicken sauce is a little lighter brown in color than ordinary brown gravy. Due to this resemblence, I’m fairly certain the Mandarin Chicken sauce starts off as a roux of peanut oil and cornstarch. Not sure how the beef broth is added – maybe it’s just thrown in after the cornstarch is browned in peanut oil.
Even knowing about the peanut oil, it’s still surprising to me how “peanutty” the final sauce tastes without having peanut butter or ground peanuts as an ingredient.
So Zenster, given the ingredients above, how would you think the sauce is prepared? Thanks for all your hep!
Zenster, another question – does silking meats allow for any degree of accumulation of batter in the end product? What I mean is this: sometimes you get a piece of Mandarin Chicken that is almost all fried batter. The Mandarin Chicken fried batter is not exactly like, say, Southern fried chicken batter (flaky). Mandarin Chicken fried batter seems to be more like a one-piece, non-flaky but very crunchy coating on the chicken pieces.
Does the silking you describe above render that quality of fried batter in the end?
Note the directions for making the sauce, and the finish for the dish:
The meat is not silked at all. It’s just dredged in plain ole flour.
I wonder about the Mandarin Chicken sauce description I got from my neighborhood Chinese restaurant, though. I guess it’s in the ballpark of the Hyatt Chinese Peanut Chicken sauce, but I was assured that no peanut butter was in the local restaurant’s sauce. Also, whipping cream was not mentioned.
Maybe the cream and peanut butter are shortcut ingredients, meant to expedite a long, slow sauce preparation?
Dairy is extremely rare in nearly all Chinese (and most Asian) cooking. Many Asian people are lactose intolerant and heavy cream (or butter) would cause dire gastric consequences. The heavy cream and butter give that recipe away as a “Westernized” variant. That it comes from a Hyatt hotel is another strong indicator.
The “silking” method I described does not use batter in the traditional sense, so there is no way one piece can accumulate more coating than the others.
As for the sauce, I’d take a large can of beef broth and reduce it by over half. Take some of the reduced stock and mix it with the cornstarch to temper it. Add the tempered cornstarch and bring the sauce to a slow boil in order to thicken. Add some garlic sauteed in a little roasted sesame oil, peeled grated ginger and some five spice powder. Add salt by incorporating a dash of soy sauce (not too much).
Peanut oil doesn’t have too much of a peanutty flavor to it, so I don’t know what they’re doing to get that taste. I haven’t heard of making a roux with cornstarch either. I don’t think the starch would brown correctly. You need a coarse granulated form of germ to do that. Your chef might be neglecting to mention that he uses cashew butter or something else. But even so exotic an ingredient as roasted cashew butter would be quite rare. I think you may be mistaking roasted sesame oil for the peanut flavor. Another friend of mine confuses the two.
You’ve got it pretty close there. I’d start with only one tablespoon of the roasted seasame oil to begin with (it has a rather powerful character) and add more if you haven’t got the nutlike flavor you want. Taste the 1 TBS of oil sauce version first and see if it has the right nutty sort of note. Isolate a small quantity and stir in a dab of Hoisin sauce to see if it brings you closer to what you’ve had before. Otherwise, go with the gravy as is.
I’d also recommend adding some Xao Xing Chinese rice wine to the broth as it cooks. Please consider floating some coins of peeled ginger in the stock as it reduces. Lessen the amount (or omit) the grated ginger entirely if you get the desired sort of flavor in the broth by doing so. You could also toss the sauteed garlic into the broth and then strain off the entire batch of reduced liquid before thickening it, if you want a “clear” sort of sauce (i.e., without any detritus in it). You will definitely be wanting a dash of soy sauce in there somewhere. Please consider adding half a teaspoon (or less) of white sugar to the mix as well. A pinch of finely ground white pepper won’t hurt things either.
I had mentioned sauteeing the garlic in the sesame oil, but you could do that in some peanut oil as well. Remember to temper the cornstarch before adding it to the body of the liquid. I hope this provides a fair rendition of the sauce you’ve been served. Please post how it turns out.
