Taiwan Styled Fried Chicken (aka chicken steak aka Ji Pai)

As a frequent eater of food and watcher of international YouTube videos that showcase Korean, Japanese, and Chinese street food - I have been obsessed with the idea of a giant fried piece of meat. In all three countries they have a variation of fried chicken, or giant fried squid and each time I watch, I crave like a zombie for brains.

Luckily, last time I went back to visit family in New York City (NYC), there was a steak styled fried meats place called Cheers on Queens Blvd (left). The squid was fine, it ended up like $9 with tax and it was all cut up, and not delicious like I imagined it to be. I ate it, I was content that I tried it and I never thought about it again.

What really tipped me over was watching Sonny from "The Best Ever Food Review Show" in Taiwan standing in a long line for... Ji Pai - the chicken steak. So crispy, crunchy, and I could almost imagine the tastes through the screen. I could feel the heat coming from the video of the fry guy doing his magic behind the stall. Now, I will mention through many of my fry-related posts of how I stink at frying. I burn food, I have no idea how to isolate the gross stuff from my oil batch. I also get unreasonably angry when I get burned by rebel oil splatters... but I really wanted to eat it - so I made it.

I modified SARTOSCHT's recipe with what's listed below:

TOOLS

Heavy bottomed fry pan/dutch oven/frying machine

Splatter guard (optional)

Frying spider or tongs

Wire rack

Collection pan

PROTEIN

• 1 lbs Chicken breast

MARINADE (mix)

• 1/4 cup Light Soy Sauce

• 1/4 cup Rice Wine

• 1 tbsp Five spice seasoning

• 2 tbsp Brown Sugar

• 8 cloves minced garlic

• 1 tbsp pressed/minced ginger

• 1 tbsp ground white pepper

• 1 tsp baking powder (bicarbonate soda)

BREADING (do not mix, set in different containers)

• 1 cup all purpose white flour

• 2 beaten eggs

• 1 cup Corn Starch

FRYING AGENT

• Vegetable oil (or other non-flavored oils like canola or peanut)

Butterfly and flatten the chicken, set aside.

Mix all marinade ingredients together.

Put chicken into marinade and marinate from 30 minutes - 6 hours (overnight should be fine)

Heat oil up. Test by dropping a small bit of flour or egg and see it instantly crackle and fry up. If it settles and just moistens, wait for the oil to heat up more.

Have all your breading agents all different containers (ie: plates for flours, and bowl for egg)

In this order: bread chicken in white flour → egg → corn starch.

Make sure you shake out the flours so there is no excess, and drip some egg.

Fry those bad boys up, 2-3 minutes on each side.

Note:

second fry jobs went a lot faster than the first one. So you need to be more vigilant watching the batches after the first.

Use a wire rack and collection pan to cool and rest your chicken. If you put it on paper towels it will get all soggy. You might as well eat a wet shoelace at that point.

& here is the final glamour shot

Have a little salad to balance that out... cause health reasons. Enjoy Enjoy Enjoy!

Big Gut/Dorothy/Little Arms