Chinese General Chicken - Ww Core Recipe - Food.com (2024)

FAQs

What is Generals chicken made of? ›

General Tso's (pronounced tsow) chicken is a Chinese-American dish that features deep-fried chicken tossed in an irresistibly sticky glaze made with garlic, sugar, soy sauce, and chiles. The dish is named after 19th-century military leader Tso Tsung-t'ang.

Worst: General Tso's Chicken

Named after a Chinese war hero, this fat-laden dish won't help you win any weight loss battles. The breaded, fried chicken is smothered in a sugary sauce. One order clocks in at around 1,500 calories and 88 grams of fat, and it delivers more sodium than you should get in a day.

What is the difference between orange chicken and General Tso? Orange chicken is crispy fried with a fruity, sweet, and tangy sauce that's caramelized into a glaze. General Tso is stir-fried in a sweet, sour, and spicy umami sauce.

General Tso's chicken and sweet and sour chicken are completely different dishes. Starting with the sauce, General Tso's chicken is a sweet, spicy, and slightly tangy while sweet and sour sauce is often served on the side and is just sweet and tangy.

The sauce for General Tso's chicken is so simple to make with pantry staple ingredients: rice vinegar, soy sauce, hoisin sauce, water, sugar, and some corn starch to thicken the sauce. Simply add the ingredients to a bowl and stir to combine.

Peng named the chicken after the Hunanese Qing Dynasty General Tso Tsung-t'ang (now transliterated as Zuo Zongtang). The future general began his military career fighting for the Qing in the Taiping Rebellion, a 14-year civil war waged by the Han Chinese against the Qing emperor.

Healthier choices include steamed brown rice, sautéed or steamed vegetables, spring rolls, or soups like egg drop soup or hot and sour soup. Veggie-based items like edamame, lettuce wraps, braised bamboo shoots, or cucumber salad are a few other great options you can try.

Points-friendly garlic sauce, black bean sauce, and brown sauce are good choices. Vegetarian options like Chinese vegetables with tofu or vegetable lo mein are also good bets. Other noodle options to explore? Chow fun, a stir fried broad flat noodle, with chicken or beef.

Sesame chicken: These two dishes are very similar. The main difference is the oil used in the sauce. Sesame chicken calls for sesame oil, which adds a salty and nutty taste, making it a little less sweet than General Tso.

Health Implications

While it is certainly beneficial that General Tso's chicken is a good source of vitamin A, vitamin K and protein, the high fat and calorie content make it an undesirable dish for those trying to lose weight. Leafy greens and orange vegetables are a lower fat source of these important vitamins.

Which is hotter General Tso or kung pao? ›

General Tso's is sweeter with a milder spice, featuring deep-fried battered chicken. Kung Pao is spicier with stir-fried chicken, vegetables, and peanuts.

In the interest of keeping things fair, we compared the dishes as prepared by one restaurant chain: Panda Express. Here, one 5.70-ounce serving of General Tso's chicken contains 330 calories and 12 grams of fat while the same-sized serving of sweet and sour chicken contains 300 calories and the same amount of fat.

Our experts say… General Tso's chicken is about the most dangerous Chinese dish on the menu—dark meat battered and deep-fried, then cooked with vegetables in a sweet, spicy sauce. Szechuan chicken, made with leaner, white meat and sautéed with vegetables, is a far better choice.

Compared to General Tso's, orange chicken usually has a lighter-colored sweet, sour, savory glaze. It's not as spicy-hot because dried red chiles aren't as common or used as heavily in this dish. All recipes ask for orange in some form — juice, zest, dried peel, or a combination thereof.

You might be surprised to learn that General Tso's chicken, a staple on Chinese-American menus, is almost entirely foreign to people who live in the country from which it supposedly originated. While the dish isn't exactly authentic Chinese food, its namesake was a very real (and very powerful) general.

While it is certainly beneficial that General Tso's chicken is a good source of vitamin A, vitamin K and protein, the high fat and calorie content make it an undesirable dish for those trying to lose weight. Leafy greens and orange vegetables are a lower fat source of these important vitamins.

General Tso's Chicken is that perfect combination of sweet, savoury, spicy and tangy with crispy Chinese chicken bites. It's a Chinese takeout favourite that just pushes all the right buttons!

Basically every Chinese takeout place I've been to has Orange Chicken on the menu. General Tso's is different, it's usually a darker, spicier sauce. They are both fried chicken concoctions swimming in sauce....they are similar, but different. As mentioned, the General Tso sauce is darker, spicier, and not as sweet.