Homemade Sweet and Spicy Thai Chicken Nuggets

I had these once at Boston Pizza. They call them, "Thai Bites". I can assure you that I have never had a craving for Boston Pizza but these I had a craving for in the middle of the pandemic. I decided to recreate them at home. They are super simple to make.

I just cut up chicken into nugget sized pieces. I used thighs and breasts. I put the pieces is a bowl and added around 6 g (1 t) of baking soda and 40 g (1/4 c) of corn starch, about 4 g (around 1/2 t) of salt, a good grind of fresh black pepper, mixed it up to coat, and left it to sit while I got the oil heated up. I use canola oil in my small deep fryer. I warmed the oil up to 160 C (325 F), mixed up the chicken again to make sure it was well coated, then dropped the pieces in alternating one end of the fryer and the other and shaking the basket to try to keep them from sticking. I fried them in batches until they were nicely golden then removed them from the fryer to a baking sheet covered with folded paper towels.

When I had them all fried I turned the oil up to 190 C (375 F) and fried them again until they were dark golden and crispy. I removed them again to a sheet pan covered in layers of paper towel, tasted for salt, and adjusted if necessary, then moved them into a large bowl, covered them with Thai Sweet Chili Heat sauce, and put them in bowls.

They were delicious.