A Baked Sweet and Sour Chicken recipe that shows you how to make the Chinese takeout favourite Sweet and Sour Chicken in the oven so the chicken is CRISPY but not dried out inside. Coated generously in a sticky sauce with a perfect sweet-sour balance!
I don’t like to shout out from the rooftops “this is the BEST baked Sweet & Sour Chicken!” because who’s to say that theirs is the best? But this is a darn good recipe. And it’s MY favourite way of making Sweet & Sour Chicken in the oven. Here’s why:
Not sickeningly sweet. It’s made with 1/2 cup of sugar which is still a lot compared to my usual midweek meals. But it is less than the 3/4 to 1 cup that you’ll see in many recipes.
Not eye-squintingly sour. I don’t know how to properly describe my reaction when I accidentally eat something far too sour! Suffice to say this is tart, not overly sour. 🙂
The Sauce tastes like restaurant sauce. Many Sweet & Sour Sauce recipes taste like they’re missing “something”. Usually that “something” is either Worcestershire Sauce and/or oyster sauce (sometimes also soy sauce). You can omit one of these but don’t leave out all of them, the sauce will taste very “flat”.
The chicken really is crispy! The fact is, you will never be able to make chicken in the oven that is truly as crispy as deep fried (except wings – see my recipe for Truly Crispy Oven Baked Wings!). But this is pretty darn close.
The chicken is NOT DRY. I have seen recipes that call for the chicken to be baked for 45 minutes to 1 hour which I find dries out the chicken. I’m really fussy about dry chicken! Mine is baked for 20 minutes – tops. That’s all you need.
Pretty hard to pick what I love more about this – the Sweet & Sour Sauce, or the crispy chicken! The chicken itself is so yum, it’s hard to resist nicking the pieces straight off the baking tray before they even make it to the sauce.
Try to resist! I promise it’s worth the wait. 🙂 – Nagi x
PS Oh, the other little thing I think makes quite a difference is using some of the pineapple juice in the can for the sauce. It adds that little touch of fruitiness that I really think makes the sauce similar to Chinese restaurants!
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Baked Sweet and Sour Chicken
Ingredients
Chicken
- 1 lb / 500 g chicken breast , cut into bite size cubes
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 large egg or 2 small eggs , lightly beaten (enough to coat chicken)
- 1 cup cornstarch / cornflour , placed in a large ziplock bag
- 3 to 5 tbsp oil (vegetable, canola)
- Oil spray
Stir Fry
- 1/2 tbsp oil
- 1 garlic clove
- 1 small onion , cut into large dice
- 1/2 red bell pepper , cut into bite size pieces
- 1/2 green bell pepper , cut into bite size pieces
- 1 can (8oz/250g) canned pineapple pieces in natural juice. Separate pineapple from juice.
Sauce
- 1/2 cup sugar (white or brown – I use either)
- 1/3 cup apple cider vinegar
- 2 – 3 tbsp pineapple juice (from the canned pineapple pieces)
- 3 tbsp ketchup (Australia: tomato sauce)
- 1 tsp Worcestershire sauce (Note 1)
- 1 tsp soy sauce (Note 1)
- 1 tsp Oyster Sauce (Note 1)
- 1/4 tsp salt
Thickener
- 1 tbsp cornflour / corn starch + 4 tbsp water , mixed together
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 200C/390F.
- Place chicken in a bowl, sprinkle with salt then add the egg. Mix to coat all chicken with egg, then drain out excess egg. (Note 2)
- Working a handful at a time, shake excess egg mixture off chicken then place chicken in ziplock bag. When all the chicken is in the bag, seal (trap as much air in it as you can to make a “balloon”) and shake well to coat chicken in cornflour. Discard excess cornflour.
- Heat oil in a large skillet on high. Add chicken (in 2 batches if your skillet is not big enough) and cook briefly for 2 minutes, turning, just to make the outside light golden and a bit crispy. The chicken should be raw inside.
- Transfer to baking tray, spray with oil and bake for 15 to 20 minutes until it becomes a little more golden brown and is crispy.
Sauce
- Meanwhile, discard oil in the skillet and wipe briefly with paper towels. Reduce heat to medium high and heat 1/2 tbsp oil. Add garlic and sauté for 20 seconds, then add onion and cook for 2 minutes.
- Add bell peppers and cook for 1 minute.
- Add Sauce ingredients. Stir until sugar has dissolved and the sauce begins to bubble.
- Add Thickener. Bring to simmer, stirring constantly. Then cook until it thickens to a syrup consistency – about 3 minutes.
- Stir through pineapple pieces (just to warm) and remove from stove.
- When the chicken is done, add it into the skillet and toss to coat in the sauce.
- Serve immediately with rice – or for a low carb, low cal option, try Cauliflower Rice! Garnish with scallions if desired.
Recipe Notes:
Nutrition Information:
I’d been craving sweet and sour chicken for a while and after having used many of your other recipes, trusted this recipe to fulfil my needs.
Just made this and now eating, and it’s hit the spot. Thank you ♥️
Only drawback was that I found a lot of cornflour was wasted in the ziplock bag, so next time I will try with 3/4 cup cornflour. As this doesn’t distract from my total delight as I’m eating, my five-star rating remains unchanged.
Love this recipe, easy and delicious, we cook this regularly. How do you think this would go freezing to eat at a later date?
Cooked this for dinner tonight and it was straightforward, quite quick, and really delicious. I forgot to buy capsiumcum, so substituted broccoli, green beans and some mushrooms. Still amazing! Thanks Nagi.
Somehow I messed up with the chicken and it was more of a dough than a batter, still delicious and will definitely go onto my meal rotation!
Next time I’ll get the chicken right 🙂
Thank You..
Another beautiful, no fail recipe Nagi, I made this tonight for my husband and elderly neighbour and we all really enjoyed it.
Next time I will probably double the sauce recipe just because it’s so yummy…
I use several recipes from this blog with regularly. They are always delicious. This, for me was a big fail. The method was labor intensive and the results were not worth the trouble. Also, it’s a lot of pineapple. The sauce is good but just a touch sweet for my liking, not bad though. I LOVE the recipe for sweet and sour pork, the double dip, double fry method really keeps the meat juicy and the coating super crispy. After I tried that one, I said, “I never need another SnS pork recipe. Was hoping the same for this. No mind, I will stick with the other method. Appreciate the recipe, nonetheless
This recipe is delicious. The only change that I made was using 2 tablespoons of vinegar instead of 1/3 of a cup (and making up the difference with more pineapple juice) because I prefer my sweet-and-sour a little less zingy. Will absolutely be making this again.
Incredibly delicious, tastes just like takeout! While making it I was disappointed to see that a recipe advertised as “baked” including frying. I try to avoid frying food as it is very unhealthy but I was too deep in this recipe to cancel making it altogether. I also did not appreciate the way the recipe was written,- it was not easy to understand. This still gets 5 stars though because the resulting dish was heavenly
I’ve made this a few times in the past and I don’t remember ever doing the pre fry on the chicken (unless I’m thinking of a different recipe). I’m certain I just lined my tray with grease proof paper and baked the chicken. Turned out beautifully.
I made this tonight and my girls loved it!! So much nicer than take-away. I think this will become a favourite of the kids (and mine!) Thank you for your awesome recipes. Just love your recipes and instructions with rationales for each step
My husband and I ate this tonite.Made your chicken fried rice also excellent. We thought it was really good, but next time I think I will put a little less apple cider vinegar.Was a bit to zingy for us.Thanks will make again.
Made this tonight and it was delicious!! Added broccoli and did double the sauce. Love your website and have both your books now 😃
My Husband loooved this. It was easy to make too and better than take away!
I made this again today using prawns instead of chicken. I think I like the chicken better, but my prawn-addicted lunch guest was a very happy camper and happily took home the leftovers.
This was a resounding success. I added a heap more veg and used less sugar cuz, yanno, healthiness, but we both gobbed it till we were ready to die of our own gluttony. My partner sends her sincere gratitude.
Wonderful!!! I tripled the sauce because we are saucy people. The chicken had just enough crunch.
This was excellent – especially the sauce. Not tricky to make and and tasted really authentic.
Awesome, easy to make even for a boilermaker. Just like it’s from a great Chinese restaurant
Such a great recipe. Whole family loved it.
My only disappointment is that I didn’t make a double batch!
Nagi, you’ve done it again! Sweet and Sour Baked Chicken is a recent discovery for me and it exceeded my expectations. The taste is just great and the recipe and notes are up to your usual high standards. Thankyou, we love it.
This is so delicious! Being a saucy person, I did double it.
The chicken remained crispy but tender.
I also added carrots and broccoli because we love veggies.
KEEPER