Indian Chilli Chicken Recipe
Dry chilli chicken, easily the most popular Indian-Chinese chicken recipe for the meat lovers. It’s spicy (it’s called chilli chicken after all), it’s got a crunch from the flour coating over the chicken and the capsicum, and it’s really quite delicious. When TH asks what’s the one thing I’d say he’s missing being a vegetarian, my answer is usually a very confident “chilli chicken for sure”.
Prep Time
20minutes
Cook Time
20minutes
Prep Time
20minutes
Cook Time
20minutes
Ingredients
For batter
For stir-frying
Instructions
  1. Clean and cut the chicken pieces into bite-sized cubes
  2. Prepare the rest of the ingredients and keep it ready
  3. Mix all the ingredients for the batter and add enough water to make a thick batter (similar to bajji batter)
  4. Add the chicken pieces to this
  5. Heat oil for deep frying
  6. When the oil is smoking hot, add the chicken pieces thoroughly coated in the batter
  7. Fry on medium heat until golden brown
  8. Drain and set aside
  9. Proceed with the next batch until all the chicken is fried
  10. Drain and set aside
  11. Heat oil and add the onions, ginger, garlic, and green chillies
  12. Saute until the onions turn transparent and soft
  13. Then add the soya sauce, vinegar or lemon juice, and tomato ketchup
  14. Saute for 2 more minutes
  15. Then add the fried chicken pieces and capsicum
  16. Sprinkle some water and cover the pan
  17. Cook on very low heat for 4-5 mins or until the ingredients come together nicely
  18. Uncover, give everything a good mix, check for salt and add more if needed, and remove from heat
  19. Garnish with spring onions or coriander leaves
  20. Serve hot as an appetizer or side dish with fried rice or noodles
Recipe Notes

Instead of green chillies, you can add green chilli sauce
The vinegar or lemon juice is optional but I usually add some for the tang it gives
You can use capsicum in any colour
You can also follow the same recipe with small pieces of chicken with bone
The batter ingredients are very customisable. You can opt to add pepper in the final stage rather than into the batter, for example