001/100 Foods: General Tso Sauce
Origins: The United States. Yeah it's not actually from China. It's either from Chef Peng Chang-kuei, T. T. Wang, or Chef Peng Jia who apparently all invented General Tso's Chicken first and was copied. Most Chinese dishes served in the US are modified for US consumption so I'm not entirely surprised.
Ingredients: Here are the General Tso Chicken ingredients that I found on wikipedia: Chicken, ginger, garlic, soy sauce, rice vinegar, Shaoxing wine or sherry, sugar, sesame oil, scallions, hot chili peppers, batter... So I'm assuming remove the chicken and the batter and that's the sauce.
Where to find it: If you do take out, you can get it on chicken, pork, shrimp, or tofu. Most Chinese buffets I've gone to also have it on chicken. The sauce by itself can be found at various stores, I get it from BJs Warehouse.
My first experience: I originally had it as General Tso Chicken served with pork fried rice from Chinese take out.
I've always enjoyed it because it's a sweet spicy. I don't always care for spicy things but adding a sweet component really helps and that's probably the reason I eat this so often. The chicken is supposed to be served crunchy from the batter but I... don't always see that meaning they've probably been sitting too long before getting to me. But despite that, my mother and I would order this (ALWAYS EXTRA SPICY, ALWAYS) for years. Though 4 years ago, we discovered you can buy the sauce by itself and this is when the greatest creation was made: General Tso Meatballs with the added bonus of being insanely easy to do and hard for me to fuck up.
I get a bag of frozen meatballs that can be nuked in the microwave, cover it with the sauce and just cook'em until the sauce is nice and hot and the meatballs are moist and warm. You can serve it as an appetizer at this point or serve it along rice. When we have it as a meal, we serve it with white rice. I'll use a spoon to break each one into fours and eat each piece with a bit of rice. It's HEAVENLY.
Other things I've eaten it on:
Steak, ribs, chicken wings, pulled turkey, cubed spam, edamame.
Last time I've had it:
A few minutes ago.
Ingredients: Here are the General Tso Chicken ingredients that I found on wikipedia: Chicken, ginger, garlic, soy sauce, rice vinegar, Shaoxing wine or sherry, sugar, sesame oil, scallions, hot chili peppers, batter... So I'm assuming remove the chicken and the batter and that's the sauce.
Where to find it: If you do take out, you can get it on chicken, pork, shrimp, or tofu. Most Chinese buffets I've gone to also have it on chicken. The sauce by itself can be found at various stores, I get it from BJs Warehouse.
My first experience: I originally had it as General Tso Chicken served with pork fried rice from Chinese take out.
I've always enjoyed it because it's a sweet spicy. I don't always care for spicy things but adding a sweet component really helps and that's probably the reason I eat this so often. The chicken is supposed to be served crunchy from the batter but I... don't always see that meaning they've probably been sitting too long before getting to me. But despite that, my mother and I would order this (ALWAYS EXTRA SPICY, ALWAYS) for years. Though 4 years ago, we discovered you can buy the sauce by itself and this is when the greatest creation was made: General Tso Meatballs with the added bonus of being insanely easy to do and hard for me to fuck up.
I get a bag of frozen meatballs that can be nuked in the microwave, cover it with the sauce and just cook'em until the sauce is nice and hot and the meatballs are moist and warm. You can serve it as an appetizer at this point or serve it along rice. When we have it as a meal, we serve it with white rice. I'll use a spoon to break each one into fours and eat each piece with a bit of rice. It's HEAVENLY.
Other things I've eaten it on:
Steak, ribs, chicken wings, pulled turkey, cubed spam, edamame.
Last time I've had it:
A few minutes ago.