Air Fryer Szechuan Chicken

This air fryer Szechuan chicken recipe will save you time and give you the same tasty flavors of Szechuan chicken. If you love making Szechuan Chicken, you probably know that the most time consuming step of making this dish is deep frying the chicken. By using an air fryer, we can achieve the same crunchiness of chicken without using deep frying method. To me, this is also much healthier because much less oil is used! 

How to make air fryer Szechuan Chicken?

The chicken needs to be marinated first and the marinate can be the same as the original recipe. Lay chicken on the air fryer basket. Make sure to spray the basket and chicken with oil before air frying. Air fry at 375 for 15 minutes. The chicken will turn out just as crispy on the outside and tender on the inside. 

The air fryer I used is Feekaa Air Fryer. I highly recommend this model and here is a complete review of it!

Other than the chicken, the rest of the preparation goes for cutting the chili peppers, chopping garlic, ginger and green onion. Super easy! 

How hot is Szechuan Chicken?

It depends on how much chilies you added to the dish and how spicy they are! I typically add a cup of Sichuan “er jing tiao” chili and they are typically mildly spicy. So the dish will have fragrant flavor from the chilies but not too spicy. If you use Thai chili, it will be very spicy with just a few. 

What is typically in Szechuan Chicken?

Typically Szechuan chicken contains dry chilies, garlic, ginger, green onion, Sichuan peppercorn and chicken. The seasoning of this dish is very simple, typically including Shaoxing wine, salt, soy sauce, sugar and white pepper powder. 

Is Szechuan Chicken deep fried?

Traditionally Szechuan chicken is deep fried to create a crispy on the outside texture. However you can air fry the chicken creating a similar effect without deep frying. 

 Ingredients:

Chicken legs or thighs 3

Dry Chili 1 Cup (or more if preferred)

Sichuan Peppercorn 1 tbsp

Green onion 3-4

Garlic 5-6

Ginger 1 piece

Marinate chopped chicken:

White pepper 1/2 tsp

Cooking wine 1 tbsp

Salt 1/2 tsp

Soy sauce 1 tsp

Corn starch 1 tbsp

Cooking oil 2 tsp

Marinate for 15-20 minutes

Stir-fry seasoning:

cooking wine:1/2 tbsp

soy sauce:1 tsp

sugar: 1/4 tsp

sesame oil: 1/4 tsp

Instructions:

1. Chop chicken thighs or legs into cubes.
2. Marinate with cooking wine, soy sauce, salt, white pepper and corn starch for 15-20 minutes.
3. Slice garlic, ginger and green onion.
4. Cut dry chilies into small pieces with a pair of scissors. Toss the seeds if you want to reduce the spiciness. Measure out some Sichuan peppercorn. 
5. Spray air fryer basket with oil. Lay chicken pieces on the air fryer basket. Spray with oil. 
6. Air fry at 375 for 15 minutes. Take out the chicken and let cool.
7. In a wok or pan, add oil, fry garlic and ginger. Then add in dry chilies and Sichuan peppercorn fry until fragrant. Keep heat low when frying the chilies because they can turn black if the pan is too hot.
8. Add chicken and season with soy sauce, cooking wine, and sugar. Add green onions. Mix well.
9. Add 1 tsp of sesame oil before serving to bring out even more flavor. 

 

 

 

 

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