Popcorn Chicken

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Popcorn Chicken

“Kids love fast food” – that’s a common perception that I strongly disagree with. Given so many healthy choices around, do I have to introduce this unhealthy stuff to my son? No, of course I don’t. To set a good example to my son, my hubby and I have decided to stop eating fast food since we moved to Singapore five years ago. For that, my son also happily follows our footsteps. The only exception was that he had a KFC happy meal during his school field trip, which is pretty fine for him to enjoy this once-in-a-while treat. Even after that, he never requests to go to fast food restaurant. I’m really that he can understand and fully support our stand.

Although I dislike those deep-frying, unhealthy fast food, I do welcome the idea of creating healthy “fast food” for my family. These baked popcorn chickens are one low-in-fat “fast food” version that I can’t wait to share with you. We named it popcorn chicken because they resemble KFC popcorn chicken. How close they are to the real one, I will leave it to your own judgement.

These popcorn chickens are made of bite-sized chicken pieces. They are pounded and lightly marinated for a tender and tasty inside, and then breaded (or double-breaded) with cornflake crumbs, cheese and spices for more irresistible tasty and crispy crunch. The way to assemble them is extremely simple and straight forward, just like how I did for my oven baked fish fingers. You may get your kids to help out as this is such a fun and interesting baking activity. A great parent-and-child bonding too!

When served warm, these popcorn chickens are so moist, delicious and super crunchy. I have made them many times and they remain popular with my family. Served with dips, it makes a superb finger food for kids. They also make a good brunch for the whole family during weekends.

Popcorn Chicken

Recipe

Yield: 4-5

Ingredients

    • For the Marinade

    • For the Breading

MasterFoods Garlic Powder

Steps

  1. Preheat oven to 200°C.
  2. Trim excess fat, rinse and pat dry chicken breast with kitchen towels. Put inside a plastic bag, pound with a rolling pin/ empty glass bottle to flatten it. Cut into 1 inch small cubes. Mix together the seasonings for the marinade in a large bowl. Add chicken cubes to coat. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 1 hour or overnight. You can do the coating in a reusable bag and transfer the bag straight to the fridge.
  3. Put the cornflakes into a food processor and process until they become small crumbs. You can also put the cornflakes into a plastic bag and crush with your fingers or rolling pin to make the crumbs. Add in garlic powder, Parmesan cheese, paprika and black pepper, and mix well. Set aside.

  1. Set up your assemble line. Get ready with 3 bowls (even plates or small pan sheets are possible) which are large enough for coating the chicken cubes.
  2. The first one is for flour.
  3. The second one (preferably use bowl) is for egg white. Crack an egg, extract the egg white and whisk lightly.
  4. The third one is for cornflakes mixture.
  5. Use a pair of tongs or clean hands, dip chicken cubes in the flour, egg and then cornflakes mixture.

  1. Prepare a baking tray lined aluminum foil. Grease the tray with oil to prevent the chicken cubes from sticking to it.
  2. Arrange the coated chicken cubes on the tray. Drizzle/ spray some oil over them.
  3. Bake in a preheated oven for 15 minutes or until lightly golden brown. Turn the chicken cubes over halfway through. Do not overcook the chicken as they will be dry and hard.
  4. Remove the baking sheet from the oven. Transfer to serving plates.
  5. Serve warm and best to go with dips such as tomato ketchup, sweet chilli sauce or tartar sauce.
Step-by-step visual guide on how to make Popcorn Chicken

Notes

  1. To minimize messiness, complete the entire batch for one particular step before moving to the next one.
  2. Instead of cubes, you may also cut them into strips.
  3. You may not use all the coating, but having more will make your work easier.
  4. If you don’t have oven, you can pan-fry them.
  5. To add extra crunchiness, you can do double breading for the chicken cubes. After step (8), dip the chicken cubes again to the egg mixture and then the cornflakes mixture. (Remember to complete the entire batch for step (8) first before proceeding to the second round breading. This is to ensure you have enough leftover egg mixture and cornflakes for that.)
  6. If your kids who are not ready for paprika and garlic powder, you can omit them. It works equally well too.