Hot and Sour Chicken

It's hot because of the Sichuan pepper corns. Except I didn't have any, so used normal pepper and added a pinch of chilli towards the end. Nice!

It's sour because of the rice vinegar. Except I'd forgotten to buy some so used malt vinegar instead. It was fine, but I think rice vinegar slightly has the edge.

So, in spite of my slightly challenged ingredient list, I went ahead with my take on a Chinese classic: hot and sour chicken!

The whole cooking is over in less than 10 minutes. Those minutes are pretty intense so it's important to prep the stuff in advance and have everything to hand.

Serves: 4
Cost per person: 2.85 zl (89 US cents)

You'll need:

- around 400g of chicken breast cut up into thin strips
- around the quantity of one whole bell pepper (I used bits of red, yellow and green peppers)
- a nice handful of spring onion (green part)
- 1 inch ginger finely chopped
- 1 large clove of garlic finely chopped
- some flour
- 2 glugs of light soy sauce
- 1 glug of dark soy sauce
- 1 glug of vinegar
- a few drops of sesame oil (optional)
- a glass of chicken stock
- 1 tsp ground sichaun pepper 
- a pinch of chilli (optional)

Let's get woking!

1. Prep the veg.

2. Prep the sauce ingredients

3. Prep the garlic and ginger

4. Prep the chicken. Dust in flour - this helps thicken the sauce and the end and protects the chicken at the beginning, ensuring you end up with really tender, melt-in-your mouth meat.

5. Wok on. Heat high. Splash in a little vegetable oil. Heat up. Chicken in. 5 minutes till sealed. Chicken out. Set aside

6. Wok back on. Add a little more oil. Heat up. Veg in. Stir fry for 1 minute.

7. Ginger and garlic in. 20 seconds

8. Soy sauce in

9. Vinegar in. Sesame oil too, if using.

10. Put the chicken back in. Chicken stock in

11. Pepper in

12. The sauce will now start to thicken. Add a pinch of chilli if you like

13. You're done! That whole process from starting the vegetables to the end point should be no longer than 5 minutes - you want a nice crunch from the peppers and a beautiful soft texture from the chicken. Serve with rice.

Cost?

- chicken: 7.4 zl

- peppers: 1.5 zl

- rice: 1.5 zl

- other stuff: 1 zl

Total: 11.4 zl

Serves: 4

Per person: 2.85 zl