Bang Bang Chicken
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Amazingly crisp chicken bites drizzled with sweet chili mayo – so good, you’ll want to double or triple the recipe!
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So our move back to Los Angeles has officially begun. The movers came yesterday and after 8 very long hours, they packed everything into a truck and started making their way down south. We will be meeting them at our new place on Monday but until then, we will be cruising along the California coast with our puppy. We’re both so excited since this is our first family trip with Butters!
But before we leave San Francisco, I just had to share this bang bang chicken recipe because it is really the best chicken recipe ever. No joke.
Now it’s a super simple recipe that comes together in less than 30 min. Easy peasy. All that takes time is coating the chicken in Panko and throwing it in the skillet until it gets that wonderfully golden brown crispness. From there, all you have to do is drizzle on that epic sweet chili mayo and you’re set!
The sauce is so good, you’ll want to eat it with a spoon!
Bang Bang Chicken
Ingredients
- 1 cup buttermilk
- ¾ cup all-purpose flour
- ½ cup cornstarch
- 1 large egg
- 1 tablespoon hot sauce
- Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
- 1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into 1-inch chunks
- 1 cup Panko*
- 3 cups vegetable oil
- 2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley leaves
for the sweet chili sauce
- ¼ cup mayonnaise
- 2 tablespoons sweet chili sauce
- 1 tablespoon honey
- 2 teaspoons Frank’s Hot Sauce
Instructions
- BUTTERMILK MIXTURE: In a large bowl, whisk together buttermilk, flour, cornstarch, egg, hot sauce, salt and pepper, to taste.
- Working one at a time, dip chicken into BUTTERMILK MIXTURE, then dredge in Panko, pressing to coat.
- Heat vegetable oil in a large stockpot or Dutch oven over medium high heat until it registers 360 degrees F on a deep-fry thermometer.
- Working in batches, add chicken to the Dutch oven and cook until evenly golden and crispy, about 2-3 minutes. Transfer to a paper towel-lined plate.
- Serve immediately, drizzled with sweet chili sauce, garnished with parsley, if desired.
for the sweet chili sauce
- Whisk together mayonnaise, sweet chili sauce, honey and Frank’s Hot Sauce in a small bowl.
Video
Notes
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I made this tonight and it was delicious. The sauce is amazing. Family members who don’t even like mayonnaise enjoyed the sauce. The chicken cooks really fast, so watch it carefully. So happy to have another recipe to add to the dinner rotation.
WHY DOES IT SAYS “BANG BANG” … i was just wondering 🙂 i wanna try this recipe for my NC II ..
No idea! 🙂
Thanks for sharing this receipe was looking for receipes that used Panko bread crumb. I had coupon for them I got several boxes of them. Yay! Excited to get all the ingredients together and make for my family!
Holy Moly! I haven’t made the chicken yet as I had cheating battered chicken chunks to use up but wanted a sauce for dipping. I wasn’t sure of the difference with this and the bang bang shrimp sauce so I kind of said what the heck and used both 1tsp of rice vinegar from the shrimp and a tsp of sriracha from this version (I had Franks but who doesn’t love sriracha?). It. Was. Bananas. Can’t wait to try it with proper panko crumbed chicken.
I made this tonight it was delicious.I double the batter and tripled the sauce .My family said it tasted just like the sauce from the restaurant Bonefish!I’m so late but I needed to say how much I loved it. I subscribe thank you!!☺
I know I’m late to the party here but WOW this was a great dinner! I doubled the batter portion and almost tripled the panko so I could do chicken (2 large boneless breasts cut up) AND shrimp then used the leftover batter on thick sliced Vidalia onions which fried up beautifully alongside 🙂
I used siracha hot sauce instead of franks for the sauce, i find the 2 compliment each other really nice.
Made this tonight and it was delicious! For the sake of those reading the comments for reviews, I’ll share what worked for us. I am not great at multitasking in the kitchen and I wanted to be able to finish the chicken in the oven so I could get the side dishes done, table set, etc and still serve the chicken hot. So as per Terri’s review above, I fried the chicken on each side just until golden brown and then drained it on a paper towel, and put it in the oven on a cooling rack sitting on top of a cookie sheet. I baked for 20 mins at 350, and the chicken was perfectly crispy and still juicy. I omitted the hot sauce from the batter as I was cooking for my 1 and 3 year old as well, which made the chicken itself pretty bland – I probably should have upped the salt and pepper in the batter. I wasn’t a huge fan of the sauce, but we just dipped the chicken in sweet chili sauce (from Trader Joe’s) and it was yummy! I can’t believe how crispy this chicken is – it looks just like the photo! Will definitely be making this again. Thanks for the recipe Chungah!
Like others have commented, the sweet chili sauce mix is really what this dish so great. I usually don’t like to make things that have to be done in batches because it leaves the earlier cooked pieces to cool off, but this dish was worth it. Next time, I’ll double the sweet chili sauce mix. Yum!
I made this recipe for the “Best of 2015” tag game….so glad I did. The sauce is amazing. I doubled the recipe and we still didn’t have enough. Frying the chicken took a while in my skillet, but we just ate in shifts. Great crunch and super moist on the inside. Loved the buttermilk dip. Thanks for sharing your delicious recipe.
Chungah – I have to ask a question (just for curiosity). Have you ever made THIS version of chicken (in the buttermilk dip) and made the firecracker chicken SAUCE and combined the two and baked? I may give that a try…was just curious if you ever “mixed it up” a bit 🙂
I actually haven’t but that sounds absolutely amazing!!
Hi Chungah!
I wanted to tell you that this recipe is OMG…amazing. I dub myself a “foodie”. I’m a great cook (if I do say so myself). Back more than a year ago I stumbled across your website. First recipe tried: Firecracker chicken. AMAZING. It is a family staple (weekly, and I do mean WEEKLY). So yesterday I decided to search your site for more asian inspired dishes. We love Bonefish Grille’s bang bang shrimp, so I thought I’d try your bang bang chicken recipe. All I can say is WOWZA! This dish, as written, is de-frickin-licious! My husband even chimed in that it was absolutely delicious (and trust me, I don’t get too many compliments anymore on my cooking, because he loves everything that I make…lol). I used 4 good-sized breasts which made a LOT (TONS of leftovers). I had well more than enough “batter” leftover too (probably enough to coat 1 more breast). The ONLY thing I did differently was the cooking process. I fried in the oil only enough to “crisp” the outside. I then transferred to a paper towel to remove the excess oil. From there, I put the chicken in the oven to bake (to finish the cooking process) @ 350*F for approximately 25-30 mins. The crisp on the outside of that chicken was unreal! And the chicken itself was moist, juicy and PACKED with flavor. I usually cook with thighs, but went with the breast on this (and I’m glad that I did!). The sauce that goes with this is ALSO amazing. I did add a little more of the chili sauce to it (but that’s only because I love the flavor). Instead of serving with a side of rice, I tried something new (asian noodles…the kind you get when you order pad thai). I cooked those in sesame oil and finished off with the sweet chili sauce. YUM! Girl…keep doing what you do because it WORKS FOR ME! I love it when I don’t have to tweak and re-write recipes (because I do that with almost EVERY recipe that I find). THANK YOU SO MUCH!
What did you garnish with? It’s on the picture but not listed in the recipe anywhere.
Lisa, this is garnished with parsley for photographic purposes.
Looks Great! I am trying this today! Can I substitute the Panko breadcrumbs for regular breadcrumbs?
Yes, absolutely, although I find that Panko yields the best, most crisp results. But as always, please use your best judgment.
The Bang Bang chicken is great! A bit of prep but very easy to make and with the wok, almost no splashing, so the stove-top isn’t a mess…thank goodness. Also, I tend to have chicken breasts in the freezer a bit too long and this is a great way to get rid of them. The dipping sauce needs some work. I suspect the sweet chili sauce that we get here (London) is pretty crappy so I’d try one from a Thai or Asian market. Also, smaller pieces, about the size of end of your index finger or slightly smaller. If you have an Asian dumpling scoop that is perfect to get the little dickens out of the frying pan, but I used a Teflon pancake flipper. I made a bit extra and tonight we’ll have crunchy chicken wraps with lettuce, tomato and avocados. Ooooh Also, I added chipotle/adobo into the dipping sauce and a touch into the batter to give it some kick. That was great. Next time I’ll shred some cilantro and a pinch of rock salt.
Hello,
i am surely going to try this, it looks so delicious.
I have a date tonight and was wondering what would be a good side dish to have with this amazing recipe. New to this!! Any help is appreciated.
My absolute favorite side dish is the garlic parmesan roasted potatoes. But please feel free to check out all of my side dish recipes here.
Made this recipe last night, and though I struggled with the frying bit, still came out delicious!
I didn’t realize how much oil was needed until reading the comments today…can you share some more directions of how to go through the frying process? I’m completely new to deep frying so things ended up very messy and took much longer to cook than the 2-3 minutes you mentioned.
Another newbie question…how do you avoid getting raw chicken on everything when you have to go back and forth to cutting, dipping, coating, and frying? Would love to have you walk me through your process, and thanks for the help!
Depending on the size of the skillet that is used, you may need to adjust the amount of vegetable oil as needed. It is ideal to heat about 1-2 inches oil to 350 degrees F.
But I am confused with the second question – there really is no way around avoiding the raw chicken. The chicken is in an uncooked state during the breading process.
Thanks for the suggestion with the amount of oil, I’ll keep that in mind next time.
For the raw chicken question, it’s more that I’m curious about your process. When I typically cook with raw meat I’m usually am able to get it in the skillet, dish, pot, etc and then clean up right away to make sure things aren’t getting contaminated around it as I continue to cook. I just found it difficult to keep things clean (like the skillet, counter top, etc) after each round of dipping the raw chicken in the batter, crumbs, and then frying. Apologies if this is a silly question…I’m just now sure how to best approach it. Any suggestions would be appreciated! Thanks.
Not a silly question at all! I don’t really have any specific tips – it’s honestly best to do what you are most comfortable with to prevent contamination.
Where can I find Frank’s sauce?
What is the equivalent?
Frank’s is sold in most grocery stores.
Hi! So far, we have tried 2 or 3 of your recipes and LOVE them! the Asian quinoa meatballs are incredible!!! My kids are dairy-free, any ideas on whats to substitute for the buttermilk? Thanks!!!
Natacha, here is a great resource worth checking out discussing a dairy-free buttermilk substitute. Hope that helps!
I will try that! Thanks!!