A Lesson In Chinese Food
So when I was about 19, I worked my first ever waitressing job at this hole-in-the-wall Chinese restaurant. It was a CLASSIC movie job. My boss was hilarious, straight from Taiwan who spoke fairly good, but often broken, English. She had some strange beliefs about things (such as hanging a bag of water on the wall to prevent flies from coming in) and some other rules based on her frugality. The food was AWESOME and I have been completely hooked on Chinese food ever since. Every day (I always worked lunches) the cook would make all the workers a meal that we could take home. But my boss didn’t want to waste money on use using her takeout boxes so I would just put rice and Chinese food in a large plastic bag. My roommates were disgusted by it, but I didn’t care, I gobbled it up.
(Image source: http://www.fortunechineseutah.com/new_images/Cashew%20chicken.jpg)Best Cashew Chicken EVER!
- 2 heaping tablespoons cornstarch
- 2 cups chicken broth
- 6 tablespoons soy sauce (get low sodium kind)
- 1 teaspoon ground ginger
- 1/2 teaspoon hot pepper sauce
- 1-2 tablespoon Hoisin sauce (depending on how much you like it)
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 tablespoon sesame oil
- 1 pound skinless, boneless chicken breast meat – cut into strips
- 1 small onion, chopped
- 1 or 2 green bell pepper, chopped in large pieces
- 1 (8 ounce) can sliced water chestnuts, drained
- 1 (8 ounce) can sliced bamboo shoots
- 2/3 cup cashews (I like roasted and unsalted)
Directions
- Dissolve the cornstarch in the chicken broth, and stir in the soy sauce, ginger, Hoisin, and hot sauce; set aside. Heat half of the oil (I mix the sesame and olive) in a wok or large skillet over high heat. Stir in the chicken; cook and stir until the chicken is no longer pink, about 5 minutes. Remove the chicken from the wok, and set aside.
- Pour the remaining tablespoon of oil into the wok, and stir in the onion, green bell pepper, bamboo, water chestnuts, and cashews. Cook and stir until the chestnuts are hot, and the onion has softened, about 5 minutes more. Stir up the sauce to redistribute the cornstarch, then pour into the wok, and bring to a boil. Add the reserved chicken, and stir until the sauce thickens, and the chicken is hot. Serve with rice.
This sounds like a lot of ingredients (and it is) but it’s actually a pretty easy recipe and fairly fast to make. You can also omit whichever ingredients don’t appeal to you (like bamboo maybe, but I LOVE it.) I love this recipe so much and it makes fantastic leftovers.
I made this and it was so so good! Thanks for the recipe. Kurt had a ton and Charlie liked it too.
Hello! I just made this and it is delicious! 🙂 Thanks for sharing! I also passed it on to a friend of mine who LOVES cashew chicken…we'll see what she thinks. 🙂
The bag of water actually works. I don't know if your boss had it slightly wrong, or if there's a discrepancy in the retelling, but if you hang a bag of water in an open doorway or window, it will frighten most flies enough to keep them out. The way that it works is that they see their reflections as these HUGE flies and keep away from them to avoid becoming dinner. I spent a few years in Korea, and they do this all over, and it really does work pretty well.