Chinese Chicken Recipes: Tasty Chicken Dishes From the East

Today, we want to bring you our favorite Chinese chicken recipes. These flavorsome and sophisticated dishes will satisfy the pickiest eaters.

Chinese cuisine ranges from inexpensive take-out dishes to more intricate meals for family gatherings. Chinese people frequently use fresh ingredients to season or marinate food to get a more vibrant flavor.

Chicken is one of the more forgiving proteins that allows you to experiment and create new dishes. Give these recipes a try and we’re sure you’ll be hooked!

Best Chinese Chicken Recipes

Without further ado, we hope you enjoy these delicious and beautiful Chinese chicken recipes.

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Chinese Chicken Salad Recipe

This Chinese chicken salad recipe features a plethora of crunchy veggies, tender strips of chicken, and crispy fried noodles.

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Stir-fried Chicken Asparagus Recipe

Bite-sized chicken breast chunks, flavored with paprika and garlic powder, are pan-seared to perfection with snappy asparagus. We also add an Asian-inspired condiment, made of hoisin sauce, reduced-sodium soy sauce, oyster sauce, sesame oil, etc., to bring out the best of chicken and greens.

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Chicken chow fun with vegetables in a pan alongside raw peppers, mushrooms, and bean sprouts

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Chicken Chow Fun Recipe

This chicken chow fun recipe brings you a Hong Kong classic with stir-fried rice noodles and chicken in a flavorsome sauce.

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Air Fryer Sesame Chicken Recipe

This air fryer sesame chicken recipe needs 26 minutes to turn out an addictive Chinese dish. It’s got chicken, sauce, rice, and vegetables.

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Instant Pot Lo Mein Recipe

Our Instant Pot lo mein recipe can help you make a flavorful Chinese staple in less than 25 minutes. It’s filled with the best ingredients.

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Chicken Chow Mein Recipe

A golden plate of noodles dotted with colorful veggies and delectable chicken pieces might be exactly what your next dinner needs. With the sweet and savory tones of various Asian staples, this chicken chow mein recipe gives you a dish filled with harmonious flavors and comforting homemade warmth.

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Air Fryer General Tso’s Chicken Recipe

Our air fryer General Tso’s Chicken recipe is a nice, healthy way to replicate the delicious Chinese take-out. We’re serving it with rice, soup, and a drink.

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Kung Pao Chicken Recipe

Kung pao chicken recipe consists of some Asian elements: fried chicken pieces, tangy herbs, and most specifically mentioned – spicy sauce.

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Cashew Chicken Recipe

Today's cashew chicken recipe is going to save you a bunch of time while taking mealtimes to the next level within 10 minutes of pan-frying.

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Moo Goo Gai Pan Recipe

In this moo goo gai pan recipe, we used skinless boneless chicken thighs and chunked them into 1-inch pieces.

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Chicken Noodle Recipe

Comforting and addicting, this chicken noodle recipe is the perfect choice for casual dinner nights. It’s a homemade classic consisting of tender chicken, earthy bok choy, and soft egg noodles—all immersed in a deeply savory sauce.

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Honey Sesame Chicken Recipe

With a cooking process done in 35 minutes, this sesame chicken recipe is here to make your tablemates rush to the dining table.

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Sweet and Sour Chicken Recipe

Looking for a recipe for a delicious dinner that’ll delight the whole family? The answer is simple: sweet and sour chicken recipe.

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A piece of cooked chicken sliced crosswise into medium pieces, placed next to white rice and bok choy

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Soy Sauce Chicken Recipe

This soy sauce chicken recipe is all you’ll need for an effortlessly flavorful dinner. It cooks chicken in a hearty mixture of soy sauce, mushrooms, aromatics, and other traditional Asian condiments. The result is tender and succulent meat that’s infused with deeply savory and umami flavors, complemented by fragrant undertones and a sweet aftertaste.

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Chicken Chop Suey Recipe

This chicken chop suey is a great way to enjoy a healthy tasty meal, high in protein and packed with vitamins. The chicken is flavorful, and the veggies are refreshing.

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Popular Flavors

The flavor profile of most Chinese dishes is complex and multi-dimensional, but it can be boiled down to five basic flavors: spicy, salty, sour, sweet, and bitter.

The most important aspect of Chinese cuisine is finding balance and harmony between these five on one plate.

Spicy

This pungent and intense flavor is common in Chinese cuisine. It may be overwhelming if you are not accustomed to it, but it has an enticing appeal once you are.

Kung Pao chicken is one of the most popular chicken dishes that has a unique spiciness.

Salty

This flavor makes a dish more appetizing, but it’s important to consume salty seasoning or condiments moderately.

Two famous chicken dishes that prominently feature saltiness are soy sauce chicken, and salted steamed chicken.

Sour

Few dishes feature sourness at the forefront because of its sharpness.

Chinese food has a well-known sweet and sour sauce that goes well with almost any protein. Sweet and sour chicken is no exception.

Sweet

Arguably the most wholesome of the five, sweetness doesn’t overwhelm your appetite. Also, it’s familiar to Western foodies, thanks to orange chicken’s frequent presence in take-out restaurants.

Bitter

This is rarely the standout flavor of a dish, as it can be unpleasant. However, it is a common supporting taste in Chinese cuisine.

The bitterness comes from Chinese medicinal herbs, which are peculiar to most people, but they are iconic elements of the country’s cuisine.

The dish of choice for this flavor tastes as special as it sounds: Emperor’s herbal chicken.

Chinese Seasoning for Chicken

Chinese cuisine uses a wide variety of spices and condiments to season chicken, from the common ones like salt and pepper to the ones more unique to the cuisine such as:

Spices: Five spice powder, star anise, cinnamon, Sichuan peppercorns, cloves, dried chili, dried orange peel, etc.
Sauces: soy sauce, hoisin sauce, sesame oil, rice vinegar, oyster sauce, chili paste, etc.

Types of Chicken You Can Use

Chicken cuts

Chinese people don’t let any part of the chicken go to waste. Popular cuts like chicken breast, thigh, drumsticks, or wings are the common choices. If you’re feeling adventurous however, feet or giblets are also used in many Chinese dishes.

Skinless or skin-on

There are pros and cons when you cook skin-on chicken.

The skin helps lock in the moisture of the flesh, and it tastes wonderful when cooked. However, most of the saturated fat is under the skin, so it’s not a good choice for a weight loss diet.

Boneless or bone-in

Boneless chicken cuts are easier to eat but more expensive due to the extra processing. We recommend using these cuts for Kung Pao chicken or orange chicken.

Bone-in cuts are a bit of a hassle to eat, but it’s tougher to overcook them as the bones help distribute the heat. Chinese cuisine even has dishes that feature a whole chicken; soy sauce chicken for example.