Cashew Chicken

Faster than the time it takes to wait for delivery, Cashew Chicken is made with tender and moist breast meat, whole cashews, and a sweet and savoury sauce.

I fell in love with Cashew Chicken many years ago. It’s one of those classic dishes that you see on many Chinese restaurant buffet tables, and that’s exactly where I found it the very first time.

We don’t go to Chinese buffets very often, but when the rare opportunity comes along, this is certainly one of the dishes that I look forward to eating the most.

My homemade version is better though, because I use boneless and skinless chicken breasts, which is not what you would normally find at a buffet. Breast meat helps to keep the dish lighter and a little bit healthier.

Let’s talk about this tasty dish.

Turns out, this is not an authentic Chinese dish at all, despite it being popular in Chinese restaurants. It’s a Chinese-American dish that combines chicken with cashews in a thick red garlic and ginger sauce.

In most cases, you’ll find the dish made with thigh meat, which you can do if you please. In fact, it’s easier to make this dish with chicken thighs, because in contrast, breast meat is so easy to over cook. But, if you follow the recipe below precisely, the breast meat will be tender and moist.

I know this recipe has a lot of ingredients, but if you really look closely, you’ll most likely have them in your pantry or fridge already. Onion, oil, salt, pepper, corn starch, soy sauce, ketchup, and vinegar are pretty much everywhere.

The hoisin sauce, oyster sauce, cashews, and fresh ginger however, might be a different story. Not everyone will have these things on hand, but luckily, they’re very inexpensive.

If you want to save money, you can leave out the oyster sauce and just use two tablespoons of the hoisin sauce. By the way, you can certainly make this dish vegetarian by using cauliflower. I’ve done it and it works. You can check out my Cashew Cauliflower if you’re interested.

What to serve with Cashew Chicken:

As you can see in some of the photographs, I served mine with a simple sauteed corn and a brown rice dish. You can most certainly serve this with steamed rice or even a basic Asian noodle dish.

Steamed or stir-fried broccoli would be a great side. And so would a quickly stir-fried bok choi – yum! To be honest, I like this dish with salad. I like to let the prepared dish sit for a bit to cool down and then I toss some onto a salad. It’s really delicious!

Whenever I eat this in a restaurant, I always like to have it with fried rice and an Asian vegetable dish. It’s such a classic pairing and it’s got all of your major food groups covered!

Conclusion:

This dish is delicious and very forgiving. You can change things up to make it your own. Leave the sugar out, increase the salt, use chicken thighs, skip the green onions, cut back on the cashews, etc. The goal is simple – put a main on the dinner table that is delicious and one that your family will love.

It really doesn’t have to be any more complicated than that! That’s the one thing I love about cooking that baking cannot really offer – flexibility. Make your own, Dear Reader; just don’t overcook the chicken!

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