Step 1

Cut some boneless and skin on chicken leg into 1-inch size pieces. I prefer dark meat when making fried chicken. It gives you a juicer and tender result. And yes, you can use chicken breast if you wish to.

Step 2

Marinate the chicken with 1 tsp of grated garlic, 1.5 tsp of soy sauce, 1/2 tsp of salt, some black pepper to taste, 3/8 tsp of baking soda, 1 egg white, and 1/2 tbsp of starch. Cornstarch, potato or sweet potato starch, they all work, depends on what you used for the coating later. Mix everything until well combined. Cover it and let it sit for 40 minutes.

Step 3

While waiting, let’s prepare the coating. I have been testing different ingredients for that. I found out that using sweet potato starch makes the crispiest sesame chicken. This is what I am using. Most oriental markets will carry it. You can also use potato starch or cornstarch. They will give you a similar result.

Step 4

Besides the ingredient, I will show you a unique method to make your sesame chicken extra crunchy. Fluff the starch a little. Get a spread bottle. Gently spread a tiny bit of water into the starch few times. Some of the starch will clump up and create some mini little balls. You just wait for 10 seconds to let it set and use the whisk to stir it. Then spread more water, wait for 10 seconds and stir it again. Do this 4 times in total.

Step 5

After that, if you touch the starch, you can feel those little lumps which will give some extra crunch to the chicken. Maybe some of you never heard this method before. Give it a try, you will be surprised.

Step 6

Dump half of the starch into a big container. Spread it out. Add in the chicken. Do not throw in the chicken all in once or else they will stick together. Try to separate them piece by piece.cover the meat with the other half of the starch. Put on the lid and shake for a few minutes. Al the chicken pieces should be coated with flour evenly. Pick out the meat and shake off all the excess flour.

Step 7

I already heat up the oil to 380 Add in the chicken piece by piece so they don’t stick together. Don’t crow the pan because it overflows easily. Do it in batches if you need to. Safety is the most important. The temperature is hight. In less than 2 minutes, you can feel that the surface is getting crispy and the color is slightly yellow. Take them out. Then we gonna do the second batch. Before that, you might want to fish out all those small little bits. It is optional but it does affect the quality of the oil.

Step 8

Keep the temperature at 380 F, and fry the second batch of the chicken. Once you are done, let all the chicken rest for about 15 minutes and we gonna double fry the chicken. Double frying will stabilize the crunchiness so it last longer. At the end we will coat the chicken with some glossy sauce If you don’t double fry it, the chicken might not be crispy while serving. You just keep an eye on the color. In about 2 or 3 minutes, it will reach that beautiful golden color. Take them out and set it aside.

Step 9

Next, we gonna make the sauce. In a large bowl, add in 3 tbsp of brown sugar, 2 tbsp of liquid honey, 2.5 tbsp of soy sauce, 2.5 tbsp of ketchup, 3 tbsp of water, 1 tbsp of vinegar. Mix them until well combined.

Step 10

Put your wok on the stove and pour all the sauce in. There is some sugar sink in the bottom of the bowl, make sure you clean that. Keep stirring the sauce on medium heat. Bring it to a boil and pour in some potato starch water to thicken the sauce. This just 2 tsp of potato starch mixed with 2 tsp of water. Keep stirring until it reaches a thin syrup texture. Introduce the chicken back into the wok, along with a drizzle of sesame oil and 1.5 tbsp of a toasted sesame seed. Toss everything until the chicken is coated nicely. Take them out. Garnish it with some diced scallion and you are done.