A hearty and filling Cantonese stew with the most saucy, savoury, chicken-y potatoes you’ll ever have this side of the equator.

Time: 4/5
There’s no shortcut to properly stewing something! Save this for a weekend.

Effort: 4/5
There’s quite a few steps, but the juice is worth the squeeze

The Winner is the Potato Dinner

This recipe has sentimental value for us, because it’s one of the specialties of my SO’s mother. Feelings aside, I still think this is an objectively delicious dish. Well browned chicken wings, fried potatoes, aromatics bloomed in oil, then everything stewed in a flavourful sauce that can then be spooned over copious amounts of white rice. The stuff of legends.

Don’t let the name fool you, because the potato is the true star. The little cubes of spuds suck up all the delicious, savoury flavour that the chicken wings and other ingredients create. By the time you bite into them, they’ve become these juicy, starchy nuggets of goodness.

The cooking process is actually quite similar to my not-so-authentic Szechuan Spicy Chicken, or the slightly more authentic Taiwanese Three Cup Chicken. Except this recipe is a more Southern Chinese concoction that uses different ingredients and aims for a less punchy (but no less hearty) flavour.

What I describe below is a two-wok method. I take advantage of the downtime waiting for the stew to simmer to cook the vegetables in parallel. If you don’t like the extra dishes that entails, you can cook the vegetables in the same pan after stewing. That way, you get to recycle the residual sauce that inevitably gets left behind into becoming seasoning for the veggies, and also make cleaning the pan easier. Or, cook the veg before the stew to preserve the flavour contrast.

Have your doubts about potatoes on rice? Don’t knock it until you’ve tried it. Make yourself some potato and chicken wing stew. Like many stews, it gets better after a couple of days as the flavours meld and develop. Cook as much as you can fit in your pan, and eat like kings all week.

(Looking for more classic Cantonese recipes for chicken and rice? Go check out the post on Hakka-style salt-roasted chicken.)

Dramatis Personae

Served 10.

Potatoes – 4 small, well-scrubbed and cubed

For all the high praise I sing of saucy fried potatoes, I do tend to keep macros in mind. This is less potato than I would prefer from a purely taste perspective, and its inclusion in the recipe means I will be cooking less rice than I usually do to make room for the extra carbs.

Chicken mid-joint wings – 2000g

For the true Chinese Mom’s Cooking experience, chop the wings in half across their lengths with a big cleaver for more surface area and better marinade penetration. But I’ve never done that before and frankly I’m too scared to try. Maybe one of these days.

When it comes time to brown them, don’t obsess over getting the perfect golden surface. There’s both sugar and plenty of moisture in the marinade, it’s just not going to happen. Create some colour, then move on.

Marinade / sauce – enough

A cool thing about this recipe is that the marinade for the chicken wing is also the sauce. Soy sauce, oyster sauce, Shaoxing wine and sugar is very much in line with the all-purpose stir fry sauce that I use with recipes like the Improved Pork and Peppers, or the Leek and Beef Stir Fry. 

Go easy on the sugar (maybe two teaspoons to begin with), but otherwise listen to your heart. Give the chicken wings enough sauce to cover everything generously.

Aromatics – the more the merrier

A couple cloves of garlic, a red onion (or couple large shallots), and a few slices of all-important ginger. The white parts of spring onions are also wonderful for this. I also threw in some carrots for more colour and fiber, but they didn’t make it into the ensemble cast photo.

Pro tip: Cut the ginger into large but thin slices, then give them a rinse to get the dirt off. No need to peel if you’re not eating it, and this way you get tons of ginger flavour without little itty bits of ginger getting in the way of eating. 

If you’re gonna add sesame oil (and you should), save it until the end and add sparingly. Maybe just a teaspoon. Heat destroys its flavour, but it can quickly become overpowering.

Napa cabbage – 1800g

Always eat your veggies! It’s a bit less than I would usually portion for 10 meals, but I got the carrots and the onion in the stew pulling double duty.

Napa cabbage is such a great meal prep friendly vegetable that I keep coming back to. It’s easy to clean, easy to break down, and doesn’t shrink down to nothing like some other veg (I’m looking at you, spinach.)

It’s also got a nice sweet flavour and a juicy crunch, which will contrast well with the more bold and savoury flavours of the potato and chicken wing stew,.

Executive summary

1. The night before, marinade the chicken wings.
2. On the day of cooking, begin by browning the chicken wings over medium-low heat. Work in batches as necessary.
3. While the wings are browning, wash and cutting the potatoes and aromatics.
4. Reserve chicken wings. In the same pan, fry the potatoes until golden, and reserve as well.
5. Fry aromatics until fragrant, then pour the marinade into the pan. Add the chicken and potatoes, plus some water.
6. Bring everything to a simmer, taste and adjust for seasoning. Cover the pan with a lid and continue to simmer.
7. While the stew is simmering, make rice and cook vegetables.
8. Once rice is done, assemble and serve.

Play by Play

Last things first. My SO’s mother would do this two, or even three nights in advance of cooking and I agree with her. Overnight is barely adequate for maximal flavour penetration. Be generous, mix well, and store in the fridge.

This is on cook day. I begin with browning the chicken wings. Medium-low heat does it. Careful not to burn the sugar in the marinade. Do it in batches, and reserve the wings when they’re well coloured on both sides.

The wings are gonna take quite a while, especially if you need to brown them in lots of batches. Use the time to wash and cut the potatoes.

Browning the potatoes next. Notice how I left them in big, hearty chunks. If they’re too small, they break apart in the stew and aren’t as fun to eat anymore.

The potatoes are gonna take time too, which is perfect because that gives me space to prep the aromatics.

Check out this big pool of leftover marinade. Hang on to that – it’s going to be the basis for the yummy sauce.

Once the potatoes are out, stir fry the aromatics until fragrant. Then return everything to the wok. Add the marinade, rinse the bowl out with some fresh water and pour it straight into the wok too. Bring the whole thing to a boil, cover, and bring the heat down to a simmer.

Whew. Rice is going in the rice cooker, now it’s time to prep the vegetables. Cutting the Napa cabbage across like this allows the leaves to fall apart into sections for easy rinsing. It’s quite a process, this stew. Hope it’s worth it.

Pan number two. It always seems like too much at first. Until the vegetables cook down. Season lightly.

And we’re done! Divide the spoils of war and dig in.

I haven’t even begun to eat yet and the smell is already making me look forward to the leftovers! Obligatory sprig of fresh herb because pretty food tastes better. Thai basil, in this case.

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