I have a thing for heat!!!! I can eat chillies with most foods (although chili chocolate can miss me) . I even make my own chili sauce, and I always appreciate a freshly chopped chili or crushed dried chili on a meal.

I recently went to an amazing restaurant that specializes in heat and fire. They do things like flambé sushi and pop liquid nitrogen into your drink if that floats your boat. There a menu item caught my eye – firecracker chicken. While they didn’t set it ablaze at the table, my dinner delivered on flavor, aesthetics and heat!!! Try out this copycat version,

Use your favorite hot sauce (I used hot mama gindungo) and jazz it up however you want, but be sure to make it hot.

Ingredients:

750g deboned chicken thigh or breast, sliced into strips

For the Marinade

Fish sauce

Soy sauce

Sesame oil

Ginger

For the batter:

2 eggs, beaten 

1 cup of cornflour

For the stir-fry

Half a cup of sesame seed oil

2 large carrots, sliced into thin strips

A handful of green beans, rinsed and chopped

Thumb-sized piece of ginger, grated

Fresh chillies to taste

For the sauce

3 tbsp Tabasco sauce

1 cup tomato sauce

1 cup Housin sauce

Quarter cup normal soy sauce

Half cup sweet soy sauce

2 tbsp rice vinegar

2 tbsp sugar

1tbsp cornflour

Shelled peanuts to serve

Cooked Short grain or brown rice to serve

Method:

Marinade the chicken for a minimum of 3 hours.

Dip the chicken in the egg, and then in the cornflour. 

Heat the oil in the meantime. Once you have dipped the chicken in the flour, pop it into the pan in the oil. Make sure the pan is not crowded. Your chicken needs to cook over high heat and quickly. Once you have cooked all your chicken, clean out your pan.

Put some more oil in the pan. Add the garlic and ginger. Flush fry then add in the carrots. As soon as the carrots are beginning to go tender, add in the green beans. Add in some of the fresh chilies as well as your favorite hot sauce to taste.

Combine all the sauces to make your Firecracker chicken sauce. Once you have cooked all your veggies add the chicken back into the bed as well as the sauce. Bake in the oven for 20 minutes at 200°C.

Once the chicken is ready and everything is well combined, serve with Short grain white rice or brown rice and Garnish with fresh peanuts as well as fresh chillies and some sesame seed.

Enjoy with your loved ones!