Lemon chicken
An easy to make lemon chicken recipe which has a mild flavour, a hint of heat and a slight sweet note from the lemon. Great as a side dish with fried rice or stir fried noodles.
Ingredients
- 550 gms skinless and boneless chicken thighs, cut into bite sized pieces
For the marinade
- 3 tbsp cornflour
- juice of ½ a lemon
- 1 egg
- 1 tsp salt
For the slurry
- 1 tbsp cornflour
- juice of 1 large lemon
- ½ tsp salt
- 1 cup water
Others
- ½ cup oil
- 1 medium sized onion, chopped
- 2 tsp crushed garlic ( I used 6 cloves)
- 1 cup chopped carrots ( I used 1 large)
- 3 cups loosely packed leeks ( I used 1 leek)
- 2 tsp crushed red chillies
- 1 tsp salt
- 2 tsp finely chopped sage leaves
Instructions
- Marinate the chicken pieces with the marinating ingredients, cover and leave aside for at leat 15 minutes
- Mix together the ingredients for the slurry and keep aside.
- Heat oil in a pan ( preferably a wok) and swirl to coat it with the oil.
- Add half the marinated chicken pieces to the wok in a single layer. I fried them in two batches over medium to high heat.
- Flip and cook on the other side.
- Prick them halfway through with a knife to speed up the cooking process.
- Toss and cook till done ( I took about 7-8 minutes).
- Transfer the cooked chicken pieces to a dish lined with paper towels to drain the excess oil.
- Repeat the process for the remaining marinated chicken pieces.
- Save 2 tbsp of the oil and discard the rest.
- Add the chopped onion to the wok and cook for 30 seconds.
- Add the crushed garlic and stir for another 30 seconds
- Add the chopped carrots and fry for a few seconds,
- Add the chopped leeks and fry for 30 seconds.
- Add crushed red chillies, salt and sage and cook for 2-3 minutes.
- Add the fried chicken and stir for a minute.
- Add the slurry and cook for 2-3 minutes, making sure everything is nicely coated with it. Do not let it dry out too much as it will thicken further on cooling.
- Done! Remove from heat and serve as a side dish with rice or noodles. We had ours with some peas fried rice.
Video
Notes
- The fresh sage can be substituted with dried.
- Spring onions can be used instead of leeks. Add the green part to towards the end of the cooking process and the hard white part at the point when the leeks were added. It will give a slightly different flavour but will taste good.
- The pan needs to be hot throughout and there should be constant stirring of the ingredients to prevent burning. However, if you see the ingredients colouring too much, reduce the heat a little.