This wonderfully crispy chicken in a sticky sauce is delicious. It is a speciality of Racquel – the lovely Filipino lady who helps us to look after my little boy now that I have gone back to work. Racquel often treats us to her fantastic cooking (Reuben loves her noodles with egg!) so I have asked her very nicely to teach me how to make some of her Filipino specialities.

Ingredients

• Three chicken thigh fillets
• 1 tablespoon Dark Soy Sauce
• 1/4 of an onion
• 4 cloves of garlic
• 1/2 cup of plain flour
• vegetable oil (about a cm in the bottom of a small frying pan)
• 1 cup water
• 1 1/2 tablespoons of cornflour / corn starch
• 1/4 cup of honey
• 1/8 cup of light soy sauce
• 1/8 cup oyster sauce
• 1/2 cup tomato ketchup
• 2 tablespoons brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon ground ginger

Method

First, chop the chicken into thin strips and marinade it in the dark soy sauce. Finely chop the onion and garlic and set aside for later.

Put the flour into a box with a lid, add the chicken and then shake it (with the lid on!) until the chicken is well coated in flour. Take a small but deep frying pan and heat a cm of oil, when it is hot add the chicken. Do not stir the chicken – this will knock the flour off and then it wouldn’t become crispy. Instead, leave the chicken to cook for a few minutes and then gently toss the chicken in the oil. Continue to toss the chicken until it becomes nice and crispy, then turn off the heat and set the chicken aside until the sauce is complete.

In a separate saucepan fry the garlic for a couple of minutes, then add the onion – you can use a bit of the oil from the chicken for this. While the onion is cooking take a large jug and add the cup of water, stir in the cornflour followed by the honey, light soy sauce, oyster sauce, tomato ketchup, sugar and ground ginger. When the onion is cooked (nicely translucent but not browned) add the liquid mixture and stir over a hot flame until the sauce thickens.

Taste the sauce and check that it is sweet / salty enough for your taste. Then add the crispy chicken (it should go without saying that you don’t want the excess oil!). Put into a serving bowl and sprinkle with sesame seeds. Serve straight away while the chicken is still crispy.

Enjoy with rice – we had yellow rice, which had just a dessert spoon of turmeric added to the water before cooking.