BETTER THAN TAKEOUT - Cashew Chicken!

So at welcome to Hot Thai Kitchen .

So today's video is my ultimate comprehensive guide to one of the most popular dishes .

Cashew chicken , which many people might think of as a Chinese dish .

But in Thailand , we also have our version which is a little bit different .

And today I'm going to break it all down .

Give you all the tips for maximum deliciousness .

It will be better than take out .

Let's get started in Thai .

This dish is called means chicken pat , means to stir fry and is the longest word in the world for cashews .

Let's first deal with our first tip from max deliciousness .

Marinade your chicken .

Yes , the sauce is gonna be delicious , but the sauce is only on the outside and we want it flavorful inside and out .

You can do breast or thighs for this for chicken thigh , just cut it into bite size strips and then we're simply going to marinade it in soy sauce .

Just give that a mix and you do this before you start prepping things and it'll be ready to go when you're ready to cook .

If you're gonna go with chicken breast because chicken breast can dry out so easily .

You don't wanna cut it too thin .

So no thinner than half an inch would be my suggestion .

And in addition to the soy sauce , I'm also gonna add a little bit of extra water and this water is going to get absorbed into the chicken breast along with the soy sauce acts a little bit like a brine and it'll help keep the chicken juicy in case you accidentally overcook it and all that water should get absorbed .

By the time you're ready to cook .

Next , we're gonna make the sauce and I'm using all the brown sauces in a Thai kitchen here , starting with oyster sauce to this .

I'm gonna add some soy sauce , a little fish sauce and a little golden mountain sauce , which is a type of Thai soy sauce .

That's got a different flavor .

If you can't find it , substitute maggie seasoning would work or just use more fish sauce and all these sauces contribute to a complex flavor .

I'm gonna add some toasted sesame oil , a little sugar .

And finally , the most important thing , Thai chili paste , not everyone uses Thai chili paste , but I think it's a must .

It's sweet savory .

Super umami .

It's really gonna make this dish stand out if you don't have it , you can make it .

I'll link to the recipe in the description below .

A mix to dissolve the chili paste and that's the secret sauce .

Finally , we're gonna organize our place which is just a fancy term for all of our prep on plate .

A we've got garlic and onions on plate .

B we've got bell pepper three colors is the classic way .

It's done in Thailand .

You don't have to have three , but you should have a green because green has a grassier note that's different from the sweeter juicy reds and yellows .

And then finally in LC , we've got green onions and roasted cashews .

Here's my best kept secret when it comes to roasted cashews .

So , you know , we all buy these pre roasted cashews from the store , but they're not really roasted to my standards .

They're kind of like blonde roasted , but I want dark roasted .

So what I do is I roast them further .

I just put them on a baking sheet and bake them at 3 50 for 8 to 10 minutes and then they'll come out darker nuttier , more flavorful and crunchier there .

The secret to why my cashews always taste better is out .

All right , let's get cooking first .

We're gonna fry some dry chilies .

Now , this is kind of optional .

But in Thailand , you always always see fried chilies in cashew chicken and this can be any kind of dried chilies .

These are just generic ones that I got from a Chinese grocery store .

It can be spicy or mild up to you .

I'm gonna add just a little bit of oil .

My walk is off for now in goes my dried chilies and then I'm gonna turn the heat on low and they turn the heat on low because these burn very quickly .

So if you preheat it and you accidentally heat it too hot , the chilies will go like instantly and you wanna keep stirring them for more even toasting .

And they're gonna start to puff and darken and become smoky and delicious and crispy .

And it happens very fast .

So don't stop and talk to the camera for too long and do not walk away .

It happens in like one minute .

OK .

Here we go .

See they're kind of frying and puffing almost there , almost there and out there we go , it should be sort of a dark maroon , almost black .

That's how you get nice , crispy and turn off the heat right away because your pan is gonna start to go crazy .

OK ?

Now we start the actual cashew chicken in the same walk that we used to fry the chili because now that oil has lots of chili flavor in it .

I'm gonna heat the wok on high and I'm gonna first sear the chicken and get it nice and brown .

That is the other secret is you wanna brown , the chicken spread it out into one layer as much as you can and then don't touch it .

Give it time to brown and develop flavor in many restaurants .

They will actually dress the chicken in flour and deep fry , which is way more work than it is worth , especially for home cooking .

But if you sear the chicken , well , it's totally not necessary and oil may jump onto your face .

So you better be careful .

Let it sear , be patient .

The darker the better .

Right .

There we go .

I got some nice browning going on .

I'm gonna go ahead and flip these .

Oh , wow .

Let the other side sear .

And at this point I want the chicken completely done .

See that brown nest , that's what you want .

If you only cook them , they will taste like boiled chicken .

If you brown them , they'll taste like fried chicken .

OK ?

I'm happy with that .

So I'm gonna turn this off .

We're gonna take it out , leaving all the oil in the wok nice .

OK ?

So that's setting aside and in the same walk , I'm gonna go in with my chopped garlic and I don't turn the heat back on right now just in case the walk is super , super hot from frying chicken and burn the garlic .

So it's always a safety measure .

Turn the heat on to sort of medium .

Now , medium to medium high .

When you're frying garlic , you don't wanna go too hot and then they'll burn mm scrape any stock chicken bits that is extra deliciousness .

And now the garlic is frying in chicken fat .

Also , I'm waiting for the garlic to start to turn a little bit golden and then I'm gonna go in with the onion .

Give that a good toss .

Now at this point .

Um I like my onions still , you know , not too soft .

So I'm not really gonna cook them .

But if you love them really , really soft , you can spend a little bit more time .

Here it goes very quickly from now .

You guys , I'm going to add my bell peppers , my traffic light peppers as I like to call them the chicken .

Oh , and all of my sauce ?

Wow .

Wow .

And the heat is going back all the way too high and task task , task like your life depended on it so easy .

Just a little prep .

But the cooking itself is very fast .

Nice .

And since the chicken is already done and I like my bell pepper quite crisp .

I'm gonna turn it off and then my cashews and green onions are gonna go in and this just needs a toss and that's it because you don't want the cashews to spend so much time in the sauce and they become soggy .

And you see how many cashews this is .

This is like more cashews than any restaurant will ever give you .

And this is the most important thing I'll say today .

There should be enough cashews to have at least one cashew in every single bite .

And that is it .

Let's plate it up .

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Mm Look at this .

That looks so good .

Better than any take out cashew chicken in .

My family is a very , very important dish because it is my husband's absolute favorite dish .

Even before he met me , he was going to his local Thai place and this is what he would always get .

And so it's one that I make often and it's one I've put a lot of thought into how to maximize its deliciousness .

Let's taste it with rice of course .

Oh , I forgot the chilies , chilies chilies .

You wanna put the chilies on top as garnish and also that they remain crispy .

This is what happens with things that like need to go in in the last minute .

I always forget them , add as many as you want because it doesn't really affect the flavor of the actual dish .

And then I will show you now how to tackle it .

So if you wanted to eat the chili because it's crunchy , you can easily just break it like that and then mix it into your bite .

And it's actually a good trick .

If you have like a family with different spice tolerances that chili paste , you can smell it .

Mm So epic .

So epic .

Everything about this is perfect .

The chicken is flavorful inside and out because of a marinade .

It's got that fried chicken flavor because we sear the sauce is perfectly well balanced .

It's not too sweet .

It's very , it's a very well balanced sweet savory , salty profile .

A little bit of spiciness from the dried chilies and the cashews are crunchy .

See the last thing you want in cashew chicken is soggy , cashews .

OK ?

So this is not something you wanna make today eat tomorrow .

You wanna make and eat right now .

And if you're gonna make extra , don't put the cashews in until the last minute .

I promise you that makes all the difference of the extra toasting of cashews .

Of course , that is the secret and that is it .

I have given you everything that I know on how to make the best possible version it could be .

So I hope you give it a try .

The recipe as always will be on hot Thai kitchen dot com and a special thanks to all of our patreon members who help support the show .

If you want to know what that's all about and join our Thai food loving community .

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Thank you as always for watching and I will see you next time for your next edition Thai Meal .