Tender Chicken for Stir Fry

This is a response to Megan, who asked me about my little secret re keeping chicken breast pieces moist when stir-frying.

Well, it’s not such a secret. I suppose almost every Asian cook would know this, but here goes……. we all know that sliced or diced chicken breast meat can dry out pretty rapidly when stir-fried without any further treatment. We end up with fairly arid pieces, and sometimes not as tender as, say, thigh meat.

The trick is to not allow the juices to escape in the cooking.

So; for every 500 gms chicken breast meat, mix in a bowl, 2 egg whites, 3 Tablespoons of cornflour and about 1½ Tablespoons of peanut or vegetable oil. Mix together gently. Season this mix with about 1 teaspoon of salt.

Fold the chicken pieces or slices or shreds into this mixture and proceed with the stir-fry dish. When the chicken pieces hit the hot oil in stir-frying, the pores immediately seal, locking in the cornflour and egg white and not allowing the juices to escape. Try it. It makes a Hell of a difference.

Note: The perfectionists would say “only the egg whites.” I don’t bother, and use the yolks as well. Perfect.