Honey Lemon Chicken - Improving HK Coffee Shop's Classic

I love Hong Kong Coffee Shop's style of lemon chicken (Sai Ling Gai). I know, it's unhealthy (nothing I love is healthy). The batter is greasy and the chicken skin's crispy from deep frying, the sauce is super corn starchy, sticky, sweet and tangy, sometimes even bitter from lemon overload....but eaten with a steamy bowl of white rice...gosh! It's a lil' piece of heaven.

Damn! I couldn't get it off my head! I spent all my weekend thinking...
in the shower...
- Gosh, I need to clean the shower room floor, before it changes from white to yellow...I want lemon chicken.
out shopping...
- I need another turtle neck tee to wear under my jacket. Maybe yellow?...I want lemon chicken.
washing dishes...
- Boy, this cleaning liquid is pretty powerful, it wipes away grease and it has a great citrusy lemony scent...I want lemon chicken.
gazing into sous chef's eyes...
- SC, I love....lemon chicken.

That's it! Enough already! I need to do something about it, and my version of lemon chicken needs to fit sous chef's low iodine diet, and it needs to be better than coffee shop's version (wow....isn't that a tad too ambitious?)

Honey Lemon Chicken

To improve:
- I used boneless, skinless chicken breasts instead of chicken leg fillet with skin
- I lightly dust them with a bit of corn starch and pan fried them instead of deep frying them with batter
- My sweet, sticky and tangy lemon sauce is a reduction of all natural lemon juice, honey and other goodies, instead of the normal super corn starchy one

Recipe
The chicken
- 1/2 lb of boneless, skinless chicken breast
Whack 'em flat to tenderize, marinate in a pinch of salt, black pepper, sugar, olive oil and 1 tbsp corn starch for minimum of 30 minutes. Pan fry just to get a bit of brownage in a bit of hot olive oil. Chicken does not need to be pan fried too long, or the meat will be dry.
The sauce
- 2 cloves of garlic, crushed
- 1/2 onion, thinly sliced
- 1 cm ginger, crushed
- honey
- juice of 1 lemon, a bit of grated lemon zest
- salt, sugar, white pepper, olive oil, a bit of hot water
Saute garlic, onion and ginger in hot oil until fragrant, add few squirts of honey, add lemon juice and grated lemon zest, season with salt, sugar and white pepper, add hot water, cook until reduced and sticky, pour over chicken, serve.

Never thought this healthier version would taste better, but it did.

Check out other bloggers' posts on Chinese food take away classics at my Chinese Take Out Party Roundup


Now, where were we, SC? Sorry about earlier. Ok...again, (gazing into eyes)...I love...........KFC. Opps!