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Kung Pao Chicken is a traditional Sichuan dish. The main ingredient is chicken, stir-fried with peanuts, chili peppers and other seasonings. It has a fresh and spicy flavor, and the tender chicken complements the crispy peanuts.
You can find this dish in almost any Sichuan restaurant, along with other variations such as “Kung Pao Squid”, “Kung Pao Shrimp”, “Kung Pao Cabbage”, all of which seem to be stir-fried with dried chili peppers and various ingredients.
But do you know what “Kung Pao” actually means? “Ji Ding” (鸡丁) refers to diced chicken, which is easy to understand. But what about “Kung Pao”?
This dish was created by Ding Baozhen, a governor of Sichuan during the Qing dynasty. He was an expert in cooking and loved to eat chicken and peanuts, especially with a spicy flavor. During his tenure as governor, he created a delicious dish by stir-frying diced chicken, red chili peppers, and peanuts. This delicious dish was originally a private family recipe, but it became well-known over time. Since he was a “Taizi Shaobao” (太子少保) or “Imperial Guardian of the Heir Apparent”, it was later named “Kung Pao” chicken in his honor.
In fact, “Kung Pao” is Ding Baozhen’s honorific title.
Ingredients
- Sauce:
Instructions
Notes
If you are allergic to peanuts, you can replace them with cashews.