Grilled spicy Korean chicken lettuce wraps. Big, bold Korean spiced chicken against cool rice noodles. Wrapped up in a crispy lettuce leaf. Drizzled with a sweet, sour and salty sauce. Just crazy tasty stuff.
Fun food. Eat with your hands food. Food to eat with friends. To share. To eat family style. Perfect for casual entertaining.
spicy korean chicken
Ingredients
spicy korean chicken
- 2 lbs chicken thighs boneless skinless
- 2 cloves garlic crushed
- 2 tsp ginger grated
- 1 tbsp gochugaru korean chili flakes
- 1 tsp sesame oil
- 2 tbsp fish sauce
- 1 tbsp gochujang korean chili paste
- 1 tbsp rice wine vinegar
- water to make a smooth paste
lettuce wraps
- lettuce boston (bibb) or leaf works well
- 8 oz rice vermicelli see note below
- nuoc cham to serve get the recipe for nuoc cham
- cilantro, mint, thinly sliced shallots, sesame seeds etc to garnish
Instructions
- Soak 6-8 wooden skewers if you feel like doing skewers. Just grilling the chicken works too.
- Combine the garlic, ginger, gochugaru, sesame oil, fish sauce, gochujang and rice vinegar. Stir to combine. Add enough water to make a smooth, fairly thin marinade. 2 tablespoons or so should do it. You are looking for the texture of heavy (whipping) cream. It’s not super critical so don’t worry too much about getting the “perfect” texture.
- If using skewers, cut each chicken into 2-3 pieces. Otherwise leave the thighs whole.
- Combine the chicken with marinade. Refrigerate for 1-4 hours.
- Light your grill. You want a direct and indirect zone with medium hot heat.
- If using skewers thread your chicken onto the skewers.
- Place the chicken (or skewers) over indirect heat. Grill, with the lid down until the chicken is almost done. This should take around 12-15 minutes depending on the temperature of your grill.
- Move the chicken over direct heat a couple skewers (or pieces) at a time. You are looking for a little char. You don’t want to let it burn so pay attention. Once all the chicken is nicely coloured remove it. Check internal temperature. Thighs should read 175F.
- To serve as lettuce wraps place a leaf of lettuce on your plate. Top with a bit of rice vermicelli. Place a few small pieces of chicken overtop. Garnish with your choice of toppings. Drizzle a little nuoc cham over the whole thing. Pick it up and enjoy. Might be a little messy but that’s part of the fun.
Notes
Nutrition
Masala chilli chicken is loaded with big chilli flavours. Green chillies, chilli powder and masala chilli sauce make this chicken curry one you will not forget.
This is not the same thing as the Indo-Chinese version of chilli chicken. It is pure Indian. If that sounds good to you read on.
Restaurant style chilli chicken
This isn’t on any Indian restaurant menus that I know about. But it should be. It’s really tasty. A little different than the run of the mill classics. But every bit as good.
Chilli chicken curry has all the goodness you expect from your favourite Indian restaurant.
Bites of boneless chicken. And that luscious sauce. The one that makes you want to mop it up with naan or chapatis. Nothing not to love.
It’s made the same way as restaurant curries. Uses all the techniques. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if someone puts this on their menu. Why not?
The world needs variety. Someday you’ll go to an Indian restaurant and be able to order something besides a tikka masala or a jalfrezi.
And that will be OK with me. I will raise a glass. Hope it’s OK with you too.
