Chinese Honey Chicken Recipe
Until now I have only tried honey chicken at the local Chinese buffets here in Michigan. Most of the honey chicken at the buffets I find a little too sweet for my liking. I decided I wanted to give it a try at home and came across a recipe that looked pretty good, and indeed it was. Basically this is no different than any other Chinese chicken recipe. The chicken is first battered, deep fried and then coated with a thick sauce. You can use a wok but I really recommend deep frying the chicken bits when using a batter like this. The sauce is a delicious mixture of honey, garlic, and ginger and rice vinegar. Serve with white rice. Enjoy.
Ingredients:
1 ½ lbs boneless skinless chicken breasts (cut into 1” chunks)
Oil (for deep frying)
Batter-
4 tablespoons cornstarch
¼ cup flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ cup water
½ teaspoon salt
1 egg
1 egg white
Sauce-
1 ½ tablespoons oil
2 teaspoon ginger (minced)
3 tablespoons garlic (minced)
1 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons honey
1 teaspoon rice wine vinegar
½ cup water
1 teaspoon cornstarch (mixed with 1 teaspoon water)
Sesame seeds (for garnish)
Cooking Instructions:
Step 1: In a large bowl mix all batter ingredients together until smooth. Cover and allow the batter to site for at least 30 minutes. Add the chicken to the batter tossing to coat.
Step 2: Heat a deep fryer to 350 degrees. Fry chicken bits in patches for 2 minutes or until batter becomes firm. Drain on paper towels.
Step 3: To make the sauce. Heat 1 ½ tablespoons of oil in your wok. Add garlic and ginger and stir fry for 30 seconds. Add salt, honey, vinegar, and water. Mix well. Combine 1 teaspoon of water with 1 teaspoon of cornstarch. Add to the sauce and Simmer for 2 minutes.
Step 4: Coat chicken with the sauce and garnish with sesame seeds. Serve with white rice.
(Makes 4 servings)
Oooh this looks yummy! I will have to give this recipe a go …reminds me of PF Chang’s Crispy Honey Chicken. Thanks again for the recipe!
YUM! This looks incredible! As much as I love Chinese food I really should start trying to make it at home. This looks like a wonderful dish to try!
Yum, another of your delicious chicken recipes. Happy New Year Bobby.
I absolutely love honey sesame chicken. I’ll have to try this recipe out. Happy New Year!
That turned out beautiful. I never make Chinese at home and you have me wanting to now.
Reminds me of sticky Lemon Chicken, which is the best thing in the history of everything.
I could be wrong though, honey is pretty sweet too (pardon the pun!)
Definitely adding this one to the recipe box. Thanks!
Yum, I love honey chicken. Yours looks great!
I tried something like this a little while ago, my husband loved it but the kids thought it was too spicy, it had sweet chili in it. I think they’d love this one. Thank You!!
That chicken looks and sounds really good!
This was good.
I found your blog by mistake searching for a Chinese recipe.
Since then my life are richer. I love your recipes, the General Tso is fantastic, and I can’t wait to make this dish..
Thank you from my friend and husband here in Israel
Hello! I came across your site from the link on Melanie’s (mykitchencafe.blogspot.com) food blog. I am soooooooooooo elated! I have a list a mile long of the recipes I wanting to make! This just might be my first recipe to try. Although I about had a heart attack when I saw you had a recipe for Mexican Pizza!!!!!!!!! Not to mention: I am so jelous of your photography skills. They are so clear and beautiful!
Hello, I came acrossed your recipe by accident. I decided to give it a try and It was awesome it tasted better then any other honey chicken I have ever had anywhere else.. My family loved it.. I will be adding this recipe to my menu.. Thank you.. Cindy
What is rice wine vinegar? I tried to find it in the store but I can’t. Is there something else I can use? I bought white cooking wine…Can I use that instead?
laynie – You can replace rice vinegar with white wine vinegar or white vinegar. I hope this helps.
Yes Bobby this helps. And this site is awesome!
hi Bobby, love the photos and composition. makes the dishes look great. cant wait to try the honey chicken for chinese new year reunion dinner, cheers christine from singapore
Loooove Honey Chicken. So glad I found your site!
Bobby,
I just made this tonight and I must say it ROCKED!! My kids ate it up! We absolutely love asian food and are always looking for new ones! Keep up the awesome work! This one is definitely a keeper in our house!!
I used this recipe as a base then I added to it. First, I omitted the corn starch from the batter and replaced it with all flour and baking powder. Also, I used two whole eggs. The batter came out perfect. Oh, I followed the rest of the batter recipe as it is shown here.
The sauce recipe is where I strayed mainly because I didn’t have fresh garlic on hand. I made a ginger honey sauce. Instead of using rice wine vinegar which I’m sure is good I used apple cider vinegar and sweetened it with some brown sugar. I also added some worchestershire sauce and doubled the honey amount. Last difference in mine I added some hot pepper flakes. Overall I don’t think it was that different from this recipe, just a slightly different flavor. Next time I will add some orange peal and chilis for a more orange chicken flavor. Thanks for the awesome recipe!
These look delicious – I’ll definitely have to give these a go.
On the Chinese Food Chicken topic, you wouldnt happen to know a great orange version of this? Ive yet to find one!
Stephie- http://blogchef.net/orange-chicken-recipe/
thats all I got.
this looks beautiful…
what a pitty where i live we dont actually have cornstarch or rice wine vinigar on sale..
do you have any ideas what else i could use
Angela – look for corn flour or if you cant find that just use flour. I wouldn’t think you should have a problem finding cornstarch.The rice wine vinigar is a different story though. You can try using normal white vinegar, or apple cider vinegar.
We made this yesterday and its very tasty. The sauce is very very sweet, but the rice helped to offset that some.
I think this would be good with julienned carrots in it and perhaps some onion.
Delicious!
Flickr’d here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/cutsie/3301145167/in/set-72157608359226116/
I tried this tonight, along with your recipes for General Tso’s Chicken and Crab Rangoon. By far the best, closest-to-buffet-tasting Chinese food I’ve made at home. I can’t even tell you how many rangoons I ate. At least six, but (hopefully) not more than 10! Can’t wait to try more of your recipes!
Hi there can you use the batter from the lemon chicken recipe as its so easy or is it to thin??thanks
talei – Yes you can. The batters are actually very similiar.
Hi – this looks great! Just a couple of Q’s … is cornflour the same as cornstarch (and can I use it instead)? And if I’m using white vinegar instead of rice wine vinegar should I sweeten it a little (with sugar)? Thanks heaps. Hoping to double this for a dinner party on the weekend.
elissa – That really depends, cornflour is different by country. What you are looking for is white powder. Normal cornflour would have a yellowish color and look like finely ground cornmeal. What you want is the white powder.
Yes, you could add a little sugar to the vinegar if you want.
Thanks heaps! I’m from Australia and checking the stores, we only have what is labeled “corn flour” but it is white so it must be what you would call “corn starch”.
Oh .. and is it definitely 3 tablespoons of garlic, not 3 teaspoons? Seems like a lot
.
i made this in our home ecconomics class and everybody LOVED IT! it tasted soo good =) i want some more hehe
I have made this and your General Tso’s recipe. Both are delicious, but I liked the batter on the General Tso’s better. It seemed crispier. Any reason why you use a different batter for this?
Thanks for the delicious recipes!
jessica – honey chicken is generally prepared with a softer coating but you could use a crispy coating such as the general tso’s if you want. I am glad you enjoyed the recipes.
i cooked this recipe tonight, i found it to be quite lovely. though a little to much garlic as it over powered the taste. otherwise a great dish!
Hi, We tried Chinese honey chicken recently from a buffet in Western Australia. My husband loved it and we wanted to give it a go at home. Your recipe is clear look delicious and it really helped. Thanks.
Will be trying this out tonight. I’m 8 months pregnant and hanging out for a pleasant tasting not too sweet honey chicken recipe and this seems to meet my benchmark. Hope it meets my expectations.
I made this for dinner tonight. It was delicious except for the overpowering garlic. I love garlic in my food, but it was too much in this dish. Next time I will make it with half the garlic. Aside from that – loved it!
I was contemplating what to do with the frozen chicken for dinner tonight…
I saw your receipe and it looked easy but so delicious… Gotta try it~~
Omg… this chicken looks sooo good… im gonna make it tomorrow… with only 2 tsp. garlic because i dont really like garlic and thats just to much garlic for me… but other than tht… it looks good!!!
My husband cooked honey chicken tonight for dinner following your recipe, thank you it was absolutely beautiful.
Absolutely delicious!
oh yeah…….this was pretty good!!!!
Just made this for tea and it was so simple and easy to cook and tasted delicious. Have to say I added a bit more honey tough it was a little gingery
Hi made the recipe and it was yummy, just loved it awesome. Keep it up.
My wife and I gave this recipe a shot, it was very bland and the ginger overpowered the rest of the ingredients. Not a great taste.
What a delicious recipe! My family enjoyed every last bit…husband ate leftovers for breakfast. Would’ve like to had more sauce to flavor the rice. Tried doubling, tripling the sauce recipe, still not enough. Other than that…FANTASTIC!!!
Hi. This is an awesome recipie. Am from india and came across this on google. Will b a regular now to your blog.
hi there, this looks delicious, I’m making a big dinner this week with lots of fiddly little bits, so was just wondering if it would be fine to batter the chicken and make the sauce in the morning, leaving it in the fridge until it was needed that night. or would it make the batter funny?
Thank you so much
—wonderful—I made this about two weeks ago—added a bit more honey to the sauce—and my husband loved it. Now, I am planning to make for a pitch-in.
Hi,
Its really delicious. I was looking for the recipe and finally I got it from your site.
But can you tell me if there any variation of this recipe with tomato ketchup? because I eat once the same recipe but there was also a strong taste of tomato ketchup.
Aysha – Chances are you are referring to sweet and sour chicken, see here – http://blogchef.net/sweet-and-sour-chicken-recipe/
very yummy will make it again
I found this recipe to be pretty good. Even with the cornstarch, it still turned out very thin when I made it. I added more honey both for thickness, and because I like the sweeter honey chicken that is served at restaurants. I was worried about the garlic being too much, but it was actually just fine (however if I hadn’t added extra honey, the garlic would have been stronger).
Makin it as we speak….batters in the fridge, thanks for the guidelines, heres hoping I can pull it off without the ginger and rice wine (the pantry doesn’t have em atm)…YUMMO & CHEERS!
Hi
You’re honey Chicken is really nice we made a gluten free batter and everyone loved it I was alaso wondering if it is atchully 3 tablespoons of garlic or just 3 teaspoons?
We will be making this Recipe again
very good i made it and will make it again
Thank you for this lovely recipe, I made it last night for a family gathering and everyone loved it and I had no leftovers!
my grandson loves chinese honey chicken and needed a receipty so looked this up it sounds just like the one he needs because he loves to cook thank you
This recipe has become a family favorite. I haven’t changed a thing and my picky kids love it! Thanks so much for posting it!
I was also wondering about the amount of garlic. I only used about 1 tablespoon and thought it was a lot. Apart from that, I enjoyed it.
i have always used honey and plum sauce in my honey chicken but this one lokks and sounds great i will give it a try i am sure it will be nice
excellent recipe, my own twist was to add 2 tblsp soy sauce to convert it into an excellent honey-soy dish, me and the mrs loved it. Keep up the good work mate
We’ve made this a few times now – the first few times exactly like the recipe stated and then after that amending a bit. The ginger and garlic amounts are good – don’t get me wrong – but create more of a sweet chicken than a ‘honey’ chicken. We cut down on that a tablespoon each and add more honey and cornstarch.
i love honey chicken!!!!!
So sooo good.
This is my second time making it.
I doubled the sauce.
i used to go to a chinese restaurant back dc. they had this honey chicken and it was to die for. me and my dad would bike there from the Potomac to have an excuse to eat there. we moved a few years back and i think i well use this recipe for old times sake!! thank you bobby
I found this recipe very helpful. I did add some fish sauce and palm sugar, also soya sauce and that took it a little closer to our take away recipes here in Aus.
hi i made this recipe so many times and must say its a winner in my house! the only thing is i use less garlic as its seems over powering once all mixed together. but a beautiful recipe… thankyou
I found this recipe yesterday and made it for dinner tonight. I knew I would love it, because I love honey chicken, sesame chicken, and most related recipes. What I didn’t expect was that my ridiculously picky four-year-old would like it. She hates everything except mac & cheese, but she ate every bit of the chicken I put on her plate! Thank you so much for this recipe!
hi, for christmas we want different FOOD!, got all the ingredients, looks YUMMY!..wish me luck!
This looks really delicious. I can’t wait to try it out.
It really looks good. I’m going to try it tonight.
hi, it might sound a little complicated, but i’m not much of a cook when it comes to following recipe dishes. Just like to know what it means to BATTER, and also with the chicken breast normally they would get cut into strips so how are they to be a rounder look at chinese resturants, thanks so much for your time, and enjoy…
i think i can smell it from here yum!!!!!!!!!!!!
Very good. Even my picky 3 year old liked it. Hubby and I loved it and it was pretty easy too. The batter didn’t thicken as much as I thought it would so after dipping in the batter I coated the chicken with some cornmeal and bread crumbs. It turned out excellent. The sauce is very yummy!!
I just tried this, it was delicious !! i’ve been looking for a recipe for years, the sauce is perfect, not too sweet .
thankyou!!!
YUM ! This looks delicious I can’t wait to try it and make it, thanks
Wow, this is amazing. Thank you!!!
Just tried this for supper tonight and it was really good. The batter comes out very crispy. The sauce was good, but not as sweet as I thought it would be, and for some reason it didn’t thicken very much. I’ll try it again with more honey. Very good recipe as it is, though.
Oh my God! I just went to heaven…this is my fave chinese dish and looks fantastic!
been using this recipe for 1 and a half years now my partner loves it.i have been draining oil removing solids of ginger and garlic to make the sauce smooth and sweeter was this just a step u left out of recipe, thank you.
I just made this for my family and they loved it! When my husband smelled it cooking he asked if his friend could come over! lol And he loved it too. I doubled the recipe but tripled the sauce could have made a little more so we could put some over the rice.
This is the BEST Honey Chicken I have EVER tasted! Only thing is I doubled the sauce, but only put 3 tbls of garlic in, plus I used normal white vinegar, and I liked a lot more cornflour in the batter mix. It is DELICIOUS!!!
that great recipe! l use this recipe to make yummy dinner thanks for that so much!
l really love it so much 
i love honey chicken, my local chinese buffet has a honey chicken that looks totally different from this, im trying to find a recipe for it. its more red looking, no seseme seeds. any suggestions?
brent- Yes, when it appears on buffets it usually looks like that. I am assuming they just use food coloring to get it that color. See when you make this recipe the sauce will actually be clear. I added yellow food coloring to add some color.
I tried the chicken and it was good .. i like the light batter on it .I always made it a different way that was really crispy .. but this one is a nice one ..
I made this tonight, i couldnt get the batter to work. I cook alot but i never really deepfry. So I tried it, the chicken stuck to the fryer basket and the batter didnt puff up… i dont knw whats going on. sauce is quite good.
Made this last night it is very good! Will be adding this to our menu!!! Id made ham fried rice to go with it!
You are the man! Its so delicious!
This is BEAUTIFUL!! I have been looking for a decent honey chicken recipe for years and finally found one!! Didn’t have any baking powder, so I substituted half the amount of baking soda, and the batter worked a treat. This will be a staple in our house now!
This looks really good! My friend and I are trying it with fried rice instead
Just made it. Really freaking good! Can’t wait to eat tonight!!
Ok – I just tried this, it needs some help. The batter was too thin and soft, the sauce too watery.
I would change the batter – you can even just dip the chicken in beaten eggwhites and cornstarch or even better, potato starch and then fry. The sauce needs at least another tsp of cornstarch and I would do soy sauce in there instead of salt.
Tried this recipe just now and it turned out fantastically, just as good if not better than honey chicken at our local Chinese restaurant. Thanks a bunch!
Do you have to let the batter sit for at least 30 minutes before adding in the chicken?
Ling- I wouldn’t say you have to let it sit. It should be okay if you dont.
I have made this several times. It is a family favorite. I only use 1 Tablespoon of garlic. The full recipe was way too garlicy for my taste!! otherwise, awesome recipe
Man, I love honey chicken. I’ve never made it before, and I was so excited when I found this that I made it the same night. I had to substitute the honey with golden syrup (have not been able to eat honey now for 4 yrs thanks to fructose malabsorption) and it is very tasty. A different type of sweetness (thanks to the glucose) but still amazing. Will definitely be made again, thanks!