Quick Chinese Cashew Chicken Stir Fry

Chinese Cashew Chicken Stir Fry is a quick and easy recipe, tender pieces of chicken, cooked in a delicious sauce with vegetables and cashew nuts. A great dinner served with rice.

If you're looking for a quick chicken dinner, that's tasty and also flexible so you can use what's in your fridge, this cashew chicken stir fry is ideal.

The flavors are Chinese, so we've used some classic Chinese pantry ingredients, such as soy sauce, and for the vegetables, just some carrots and mushrooms.

You can be as flexible as you like with this recipe, so feel free to add whatever vegetables your family enjoys. We've used beans, bean sprouts, broccoli, zucchini and all kinds of veggies in this recipe before so don't be afraid to add what you like!

For the chicken, we often use thigh meat because it tastes much sweeter and there is never any fear of the meat drying out. If you prefer chicken breast, then you can use that.

You'll notice from the ingredients, we've added some cornstarch mixed with water. This is just a simple way of velveting, or softening the chicken meat (especially if using breast), so you get a silky smooth texture when you bite into the meat. Some restaurants use beaten egg white to achieve the same velveting effect.

The best way to eat this cashew chicken dinner is with some rice, or noodles. Serve it piping hot from the wok and enjoy!

Or serve this with our simple egg fried rice recipe, it will be delicious for sure!

Prep Time

10 minutes

Cook Time

15 minutes

Serves

2 - 4

Ingredients

2 chicken breasts or 4 thighs, boneless
6 Mushrooms
1 Onion
1 Carrot
½ cup Cashew Nuts
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1-inch piece of fresh ginger, peeled and finely chopped.

The marinade

1 Tablespoon soy sauce
1 tablespoon Chinese Rice Wine
2 Tablespoons Oyster Sauce
1 Tablespoon Cornstarch
2 tablespoons water

The garnish

Sliced scallions and or chopped cilantro

Instructions

1. In a small bowl, add the cornstarch with 2 tablespoons of water and mix until combined.

2. Make up the marinade by adding all the marinade ingredients to a bowl and mixing well. Set aside.

3. Cut the chicken into bite-sized pieces and transfer it to the bowl of marinade. Then and add to the cornstarch mixture and combine making sure the chicken is coated. 

4. Cut the onion into quarters or smaller. Peel and slice the carrots into bite-sized pieces. I used a small cookie cutter to make shapes just for fun! Cut the mushrooms into quarters.

5. Chop the garlic and ginger and set aside.

6. Heat up a wok or large frying pan with a tablespoon of cooking oil and add the chicken plus the marinade, garlic, and ginger. 

7. Keep moving the chicken around so it cooks evenly. After 5 minutes, add the onions, carrots, mushrooms, and cashew nuts. Again, keep stirring so everything cooks evenly. 

Turn the heat down to low,  and allow to cook for another 10 minutes. Serve with some rice. 

Substitutions

You can use other vegetables just make sure you cut them all roughly the same size so they cook evenly. here are some other vegetables we've used in this stir fry

• Zucchini
• Broccoli
• Vegetarian - You can easily substitute the chicken for tofu

Variations

• Spicy - We haven't spiced this recipe, however, if you wanted to add a twist to it, add 1 teaspoon of dried chilli
• Deluxe - Add a tablespoon of sesame seeds at the end and sprinkle over the top.
• Kid friendly - make it fun by using your cookie cutters to make shapes from the vegetables.

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