Chinese Chicken Balls with Sweet and Sour Sauce

This ultimate Chinese Chicken Balls with Sweet and Sour is a highly requested recipe on the blog. This recipe brings together a Chinese restaurant-style battered chicken with homemade sweet and tangy dipping sauce!

Jump to:

• Why you need to try this recipe
• Ingredients explained & variations
• How to make sweet and sour chicken balls
• Frequently asked questions
• Watch How To Make It Recipe Video
• Chicken Balls with Sweet and Sour Sauce

With our simple tips, you can make very fluffy, crispy, non-greasy, chicken balls with simple ingredients in no time!

You can find this dish on the menu of every Chinese restaurant and takeaway in the UK. If you are a seafood fan, you might also like our favourite Crispy Sweet and Sour Prawn Balls recipe, made with king prawns and homemade sauce!

Why you need to try this recipe

• These chicken balls are classic Chinese appetizers that all kids and adults love. Perfect as a starter, main meal, finger food, or party snack. Your dinner guests will definitely love it!
• Super addictive, easy to make, and budget-friendly!
• If you can make it right, it is faster and tastes way better than ordering from a Chinese restaurant/takeaway!

Ingredients explained & variations

Chicken: Ideal to make with boneless chicken breast, but you can also try it with boneless chicken thigh or prawns.

For vegetarian options, use tofu or cauliflower heads, cut into 1" cubes and skip the marinade part. Season with seasoning ingredients and coat with the batter straight away.

Batter: I use plain flour, corn starch, baking soda, salt and water. The batter consistency should be medium thick, not too thick not too watery. If you prefer thick batter, reduce the water amount and create a thick batter.

Can I use self-raising flour? If you have self-raising flour in hand, you can add self-raising flour and corn starch ( flour to corn starch ratio is 1 : ½ ). Skip the salt and baking soda if they are already in self-raising flour.

Dipping Sauce: Ketchup, white vinegar, and sugar are the 3 essential ingredients to make sweet and sour. I add tomato puree to bring more red colour, if you don't have it in hand you can skip it and add tomato ketchup instead. You will also need a pinch of salt to taste and cornstarch to thicken the sauce.

You can add extra lemon juice or pineapple juice to bring more flavour. Some restaurants add msg in their sauce, but we don't think it is necessary because it has already sugar inside and perfectly taste great on its own.

How to make sweet and sour chicken balls

You'll need 4 simple steps to make:

1. First marinate the chicken dices.
2. Coat the marinated chicken pieces with constarch and batter.
3. Double fry until crispy golden brown.
4. Make the sweet and tangy dipping sauce.

Chicken Marinade

Marinating is the most important part that you can't skip. Simply season with salt, white pepper, sesame oil, sugar, baking soda, garlic paste, and cornstarch.

Mix it well with your hands and let it sit and marinate for at least 30 minutes to 1 hour. Adding a pinch of baking soda and cornstarch is a secret of Chinese cooking that keeps the meat moist and tender when you fry with high heat.

Batter for Chicken Balls

This recipe is adapted from our friend, a Chinese chef. Authentic Chinese restaurant chicken cubes are coated with quite a lot of batter and fluffy. But I prefer my homemade recipe with less batter, so ours is a bit lighter and crisper coating texture.

To make the batter mix, you will need plain flour ( all-purpose flour ), corn starch, salt, baking soda, and water. Adding baking soda to the mixture creates a puffy, crispy texture. Plain flour and corn starch together make the perfect golden colour.

Deep Frying

Deep frying is the best method to achieve crispy, airy, perfectly golden chicken balls. Highly recommend deep fry instead of shallow fry or air-fry.

Why double fry? Double frying is crucial to create a crispy batter and juicy chicken meat inside. The coating will stay crispy for hours, less greasy, and airy.

Temperature for frying? You need to fry with high heat between 340-350'F, you can check with a food thermometer or wooden chopstick. If the oil bubbles are sizzling steadily, it's ready to fry. Or add a splash of batter in the hot oil, if the batters float and sizzle straightaways, it's ready to fry.

Which oil to use? Vegetable oil or other neutral flavour oil like canola, grapeseed, sunflower oil is best for deep frying for this recipe.

Can you resue the fried oil? We reuse the fried oil by clearing out the crumbs with a mesh strainer once it cools down. Keep in air-tight containers or jars and use in other stir fry dishes or curries.

Sweet and Sour Sauce

Sweet and sour sauce is an ideal dipping sauce to serve with Chinese chicken balls. It's so easy to make at home and tastes just like the sauce you've had at a Chinese restaurant. You can serve the sauce and fried chicken separately or tossed the fried chicken with the sauce and coat them with the sauce completely and serve.

Combine all the ketchup, tomato puree, vinegar, sugar, cornstarch, water, and salt in a small saucepan and simmer with low heat until slightly thick. Or you can adjust to your desire consistency by adding more or less water.

Frequently asked questions

Watch How To Make It Recipe Video

What to serve with this dish

You can serve this dish on its own with sweet and sour sauce, or a choice of dipping sauce. We love to have with sweet chilli sauce and Thai Sariracha sauce too. Or you can pair it with other Chinese dishes and make it a perfect fakeaway dinner! Here is a handful of our favourite classic Chinese recipes you might like to try out:

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