Learn how to make Chinese roasted chicken with a simplified method.Roasted chicken (烧鸡) actually is a large group of dish in China, differ from different area and cuisine.The recipe introduced here creates paper thin skins and tender meat.
After getting the embed large oven as a birthday gift in my kitchen, I decided to develop several yummy whole roasted chicken as a return to my family in addition to different kinds of sweet desserts (Hong Kong Egg tarts) and soft asian buns (milk bread). Fortunately, I get more than 5 quite yummy recipes to share in this year. I have re-tested them several times in the past year. Cooking with oven is much easier and energy saving comparing with wok because the later involves lots of cutting, chopping and stir-frying. Though the entire process of this Chinese roasted chicken takes a little bit long, it is quite easy.
There is a much complex but softer version popular in China. The Chicken is pre-cooked in a soy sauce flavored soup base, followed by a long air-drying process. Then roast with honey water or light soy sauce. This recipe uses a very similar concept but different approaches. Marinating is responsible for all the flavoring tasks.
Tips
- The actual roasting time is very much based on the weight of your chicken. I usually use 1kg smaller chicken for oven roasted chicken. For 1.5 kg chicken, the low temperature roasting time should at least 30 minutes.
- Do not brush any oil or honey on the skin so you can make paper-thin crispy skin.
- Remember to lower the temperature later to most of the inside juice can be kept.
Ingredients
1 chicken (around 1 kg )
Marinade
- 4 cloves garlic, sliced
- 1 thumb ginger, sliced
- 2 green onion, cut into small sections
- 1 tbsp. Shaoxing wine
- 1/2 cup soy sauce
- 1 tbsp. sugar
- 1 tsp. salt
- 1/2 tsp. five spice powder
Steps
1.Clean the chicken and soak in clean water for 15 minutes. Then massage with white vinegar, set aside for 10 minutes. Then rinse the chicken with paper (drying process is quite important). Rubbing with white vinegar can help to remove any oddness taste if exists.
2.Combine all the marinade ingredient in a small bowl. Prepare a large bag, place the chicken in and then add all the marinade sauce. Rub the bag gently to make sure the chicken is evenly coated by the sauce. Keep in fridge at least overnight to 48 hours. Flip 2-3 times.
3.Take only the chicken out (discard the liquid and all the other spices). Truss the the legs and place on a baking sheet (breast up) and then air dry until the skin becomes tightened and dry (usually take 1 to 4 hours based on the room condition).
4 hours later with air drying
4. Preheat the oven to 200 degree C (400 Degree F). Place the chicken on the low rack and roast for 30 minutes. Lower the temperature to 120 degree C (250 degree F) and bake for another 20 minutes (you can rotate your roasting pan).
5.Cooled down for 15 minutes before shredding and enjoy. You can serve it with spicy sauce, soy sauce or plum sauce. You can easily apart the chicken with hands.
By the way, if you love to cook whole chicken, check salt baked chicken (盐焗鸡) and Chinese style braised chicken with spices and soy sauce (脱骨卤鸡), and in summer time, you must try tender and milk white cut chicken and spicy Sichuan mouthwatering chicken.
- 1 chicken (around 1 kg )
- 4 cloves garlic, sliced
- 1 thumb ginger, sliced
- 2 green onion, cut into smaller sections
- 1 tbsp. Shaoxing wine
- ½ cup soy sauce
- 1 tbsp. sugar
- 1 tsp. salt
- ½ tsp. five spice powder
- Clean the chicken and soak in clean water for 15 minutes. Then message with white vinegar, set aside for 10 minutes. Then rinse the chicken with paper (drying process is quite important).
- Combine all the marinade ingredient in a small bowl.
- Prepare a large bag, place the chicken in and then add all the marinade sauce. Rub the bag gently to make sure the chicken is evenly coated by the sauce. Keep in fridge at least overnight to 48 hours. Flip 2-3 times.
- Take only the chicken out (discard the liquid and all the other spices). Truss the legs and place on a baking sheet (beast up) and then air dry until the skin becomes tightened and dry (usually take 1 to 4 hours based on the room condition).
- Preheat the oven to 200 degree C (400 Degree F). Place the chicken on the low rack and roast for 30 minutes. Lower the temperature to 120 degree C (250 degree F) and bake for another 20 minutes (you can rotate the baking pan).
- Cooled down for 15 minutes before shredding and enjoy. You can serve it with spicy sauce, soy sauce or plum sauce.
Getting an oven for a birthday present – really, that defines a food enthusiast..:-)
Your recipe is very interesting as I usually cook/simmer chicken below 1 kg to prevent the meat from getting dry.
I will definitely try this .The papery skin looks delicious.
Hi, Susanne
This roasted chicken is one of my daughter’s favorite dish, especially the papery crisp skin. I recommend this recipe to the chicken lovers.
Oh This looks so good. It’s tricky to get this paper-thin skin done correctly. You’ve done a brilliant job. Pinning!
Thanks Wei. I develop based on my daughter’s love to paper-thin roasted chicken skin. She is quite picky.
The photo of the chicken marinating seems to include green onions but the recipe does not mention that ingredient. Please advise.
Thanks for the correctness Jack. Recipe updated!
This is one of my favorite chinese takeout food. i’ll definitely give this a try..thanks for sharing
It comes out quite satisfying. Go ahead and good luck.
Hi Elaine,
A few questions:
For step 1: after soaking the chicken in water for 15min, do we have to dry the chicken first before rubbing with white vinegar? How much white vinegar to use? Do we have to rinse off the white vinegar with water before drying the chicken with paper? What’s the purpose of rubbing with white vinegar?
For step 5: what do you mean by rotate the chicken? Do you mean turning it upside down?
Thanks for your recipe! Really hope I can make this roasted chicken with paper-thin skin successfully.
Hi Rachel,
For your questions:
1. You can slightly dry the chicken but no restrict limit. Rubbing with white vinegar can help to remove any oddness taste if exists. Only a small amount is enough. Just make sure all of the skin is rubbed.
2. I just mean rotate the roasting pan, do not move the chicken.
Good luck. It should come out great.
This recipe worked well — i bought a small “yellow chicken” in NY’s Chinatown and marinated it for 48 hours. It came out excellent. Thank you Elaine.
Great Jack. Thanks for the wonderful feedback. I am so glad to hear it works fine for you.
The roasted chicken was super fantastic, this may become a weekly go-to chicken recipe. A small anecdote during roasting: the oven got sooo hot, the chicken juices (i think) got so hot too. It became smoky in the our condo unit. Uh-oh, the smoke detector might go off 🙂 We turned on all fans and opened windows wide and it was cleared in no time. We’re thinking of cooking two chickens at a time, one to dine, one for make-ahead meal. Thank you so much Elaine for sharing your wonderful recipe!
I make two chickens at a time in all of my follow attempts. It is much economic. I believe your chicken contains more fat than mince because that anecdote never happened to me. Happy cooking and thanks for dropping by and leaving me such an encouraging comment.
I love this roasted chicken just as you described, juicy and tender. It is one of my daughter’s favorite. Thanks for trying!! Happy cooking.
Thank you so much for sharing all of these wonderful recipes with us. I was delighted when I found your blog, and am delighted every time I visit. I made this dish tonight, after a 48 hour marinade and it was wonderful! I had vegetables I needed to use, and made your Sichuan fried rice and Sichuan dry fried beans (the less oil version). Both were wonderful! I tried stir fried lettuce after reading about it on your fantastic website, do you have a recipe you prefer for This? It was quite good. I have many more of your recipes bookmarked to try in the coming weeks, I love the detail you put into each page. Thank you again!
Another great comment that can make a a day, Kim. You are so nice!!! I hope you will have great result with the up-coming dishes. Happy cooking and I am honored to have readers like you.
Is there a way to modify this recipe for a larger bird? Perhaps around 4.5 lbs?
Hi Jessica,
I still recommend using a smaller bird. But if you want to use large bird, make sure the marinating time is 48 hours and lengthen the second roasting time to 1 hour.
Is this what some restaurants call “Hong Kong roast chicken”?
That might be the name.