General Tso's chicken
Encyclopedia
General Tso' s chicken (sometimes Governor Tso's chicken, General Tao's chicken, General Tsao's chicken, General Gow's Chicken, General Gao's chicken, or General Gau's chicken) is a sweet
and spicy, deep-fried chicken
dish
that is popularly served in North American Chinese restaurants. The dish was unknown in China
and other lands home to the Chinese diaspora
before it was introduced by chefs returning from the United States.
The dish is named after General Tso Tsung-tang, or Zuo Zongtang
, a Qing dynasty
general and statesman, although this connection is tenuous. He is said to have enjoyed it, and perhaps helped create a dish, but there are no recorded recipes. The real roots of the dish lie in the post 1949 exodus of chefs to the United States. The dish is reported to have been introduced to New York City
in the early 1970s as an example of Hunan
cooking, though it is not typical of Hunanese cuisine, which is traditionally very spicy and rarely sweet. The dish was first mentioned in The New York Times in 1977.
(左宗棠, 1812–1885), a Qing Dynasty
general from Hunan
. Zuo himself could not have eaten the dish as it is today, and the dish is neither found in Changsha, the capital of Hunan, nor in Xiangyin, the home of General Tso. Moreover, descendants of General Tso still living in Xiangyin, when interviewed, say that they have never heard of such a dish.
There are several stories concerning the origin of the dish. Eileen Yin-Fei Lo states in her book The Chinese Kitchen that the dish originates from a simple Hunan chicken dish, and that the reference to "Zongtang" was not a reference to Zuo Zongtang's given name, but rather a reference to the homonym "zongtang", meaning "ancestral meeting hall" . Consistent with this interpretation, the dish name is sometimes (but considerably less commonly) found in Chinese as "Zuo ancestral hall chicken" . (Chung tong gai is a transliteration of “ancestral meeting hall chicken” from Cantonese; Zuǒ Zōngtáng jī is the standard name of General Tso's chicken as transliterated from Mandarin.)
in the New York Times, one claim is that the recipe was invented by Taiwan-based Hunan cuisine chef Peng Chang-kuei (a.k.a. Peng Jia) , who had been an apprentice of Cao Jingchen's, a famous early 20th century Chinese chef. Peng was the Nationalist
government banquets' chef and fled with Chiang Kai-shek
's forces to Taiwan during the Chinese civil war
. There, he continued his career as official chef until 1973, when he moved to New York to open a restaurant. That was where Peng Jia started inventing new dishes and modifying traditional ones; one new dish, General Tso's chicken, was originally prepared without sugar, and subsequently altered to suit the tastes of "non-Hunanese people." The popularity of the dish has now led to it being "adopted" by local Hunanese chefs and food writers, perhaps as an acknowledgment of the dish's unique status, upon which the international reputation of Hunanese cuisine was largely based. Ironically, when Peng Jia opened a restaurant in Hunan in the 1990s introducing General Tso's chicken, the restaurant closed without success because the locals found the dish too sweet.
New York's Shun Lee Palace
s, East (155 E. 55th St.) and West (43 W. 65th St.) also says that it was the first restaurant to serve General Tso's chicken and that it was invented by a Chinese immigrant chef named T. T. Wang in 1972. Michael Tong, owner of New York's Shun Lee Palaces, says, "We opened the first Hunanese restaurant in the whole country, and the four dishes we offered you will see on the menu of practically every Hunanese restaurant in America today. They all copied from us."
The two stories can be somewhat reconciled in that the current General Tso's chicken recipe—where the meat is crispy fried—was introduced by Chef Wang, but as "General Ching's chicken," a name which still has trace appearances on menus on the Internet. However, the name "General Tso's chicken" traces to Chef Peng, who cooked it in a different way.
or General Tso's veg (soy protein). Other variants sometimes substitute shrimp, beef, or pork for the chicken.
Traditional basic ingredients include:
Sauce: soy sauce, rice wine, rice wine vinegar, sugar, cornstarch, dried red chili peppers (whole), garlic, MSG.
batter/breading: egg, cornstarch.
dish: Broccoli, meat (cubed).
, the dish is served in the main mess hall, King Hall, as "Admiral Tso's Chicken", reflecting a nautical theme. The Pei Wei
chain of Chinese restaurants has a "Pei Wei Spicy" preparation (which can be served with chicken or other types of meat and vegetables). The menu says "our version of General Chu" in parentheses. It is made with "chile vinegar sauce, scallion
, garlic, snap pea
s, carrot."
Outside North America, one notable establishment that serves General Tso's chicken is the Taiwanese restaurant Peng Chang-kuei, which is credited by some sources as the inventor of the dish. Differences between this "original" dish and that commonly encountered in North America are that it is not sweet and sour in flavor, the chicken is cooked with its skin, and soy sauce plays a much more prominent role.
Sugar
Sugar is a class of edible crystalline carbohydrates, mainly sucrose, lactose, and fructose, characterized by a sweet flavor.Sucrose in its refined form primarily comes from sugar cane and sugar beet...
and spicy, deep-fried chicken
Chicken (food)
Chicken is the most common type of poultry in the world, and is prepared as food in a wide variety of ways, varying by region and culture.- History :...
dish
Dish (food)
A dish in gastronomy is a specific food preparation, a "distinct article or variety of food", with cooking finished, and ready to eat, or be served.A "dish" may be served on dishware, or may be eaten out of hand; but breads are generally not called "dishes"....
that is popularly served in North American Chinese restaurants. The dish was unknown in China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
and other lands home to the Chinese diaspora
Overseas Chinese
Overseas Chinese are people of Chinese birth or descent who live outside the Greater China Area . People of partial Chinese ancestry living outside the Greater China Area may also consider themselves Overseas Chinese....
before it was introduced by chefs returning from the United States.
The dish is named after General Tso Tsung-tang, or Zuo Zongtang
Zuo Zongtang
Zuo Zongtang , spelled Tso Tsung-t'ang in Wade-Giles and known simply as General Tso in the West, was a Chinese statesman and military leader in the late Qing Dynasty....
, a Qing dynasty
Qing Dynasty
The Qing Dynasty was the last dynasty of China, ruling from 1644 to 1912 with a brief, abortive restoration in 1917. It was preceded by the Ming Dynasty and followed by the Republic of China....
general and statesman, although this connection is tenuous. He is said to have enjoyed it, and perhaps helped create a dish, but there are no recorded recipes. The real roots of the dish lie in the post 1949 exodus of chefs to the United States. The dish is reported to have been introduced to New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
in the early 1970s as an example of Hunan
Hunan cuisine
Hunan cuisine, sometimes called Xiang cuisine , consists of the cuisines of the Xiang River region, Dongting Lake and western Hunan Province, in China. Hunan cuisine consists of three styles:...
cooking, though it is not typical of Hunanese cuisine, which is traditionally very spicy and rarely sweet. The dish was first mentioned in The New York Times in 1977.
Name and origins
The dish has been associated with the name of Zuo ZongtangZuo Zongtang
Zuo Zongtang , spelled Tso Tsung-t'ang in Wade-Giles and known simply as General Tso in the West, was a Chinese statesman and military leader in the late Qing Dynasty....
(左宗棠, 1812–1885), a Qing Dynasty
Qing Dynasty
The Qing Dynasty was the last dynasty of China, ruling from 1644 to 1912 with a brief, abortive restoration in 1917. It was preceded by the Ming Dynasty and followed by the Republic of China....
general from Hunan
Hunan
' is a province of South-Central China, located to the south of the middle reaches of the Yangtze River and south of Lake Dongting...
. Zuo himself could not have eaten the dish as it is today, and the dish is neither found in Changsha, the capital of Hunan, nor in Xiangyin, the home of General Tso. Moreover, descendants of General Tso still living in Xiangyin, when interviewed, say that they have never heard of such a dish.
There are several stories concerning the origin of the dish. Eileen Yin-Fei Lo states in her book The Chinese Kitchen that the dish originates from a simple Hunan chicken dish, and that the reference to "Zongtang" was not a reference to Zuo Zongtang's given name, but rather a reference to the homonym "zongtang", meaning "ancestral meeting hall" . Consistent with this interpretation, the dish name is sometimes (but considerably less commonly) found in Chinese as "Zuo ancestral hall chicken" . (Chung tong gai is a transliteration of “ancestral meeting hall chicken” from Cantonese; Zuǒ Zōngtáng jī is the standard name of General Tso's chicken as transliterated from Mandarin.)
Taiwan claim
As documented by Fuchsia DunlopFuchsia Dunlop
Fuchsia Dunlop is an English writer and chef who specialises in Chinese cuisine. She was an East Asian analyst at the BBC World Service and has three books to her name, including the autobiography Shark's Fin and Sichuan Pepper...
in the New York Times, one claim is that the recipe was invented by Taiwan-based Hunan cuisine chef Peng Chang-kuei (a.k.a. Peng Jia) , who had been an apprentice of Cao Jingchen's, a famous early 20th century Chinese chef. Peng was the Nationalist
Kuomintang
The Kuomintang of China , sometimes romanized as Guomindang via the Pinyin transcription system or GMD for short, and translated as the Chinese Nationalist Party is a founding and ruling political party of the Republic of China . Its guiding ideology is the Three Principles of the People, espoused...
government banquets' chef and fled with Chiang Kai-shek
Chiang Kai-shek
Chiang Kai-shek was a political and military leader of 20th century China. He is known as Jiǎng Jièshí or Jiǎng Zhōngzhèng in Mandarin....
's forces to Taiwan during the Chinese civil war
Chinese Civil War
The Chinese Civil War was a civil war fought between the Kuomintang , the governing party of the Republic of China, and the Communist Party of China , for the control of China which eventually led to China's division into two Chinas, Republic of China and People's Republic of...
. There, he continued his career as official chef until 1973, when he moved to New York to open a restaurant. That was where Peng Jia started inventing new dishes and modifying traditional ones; one new dish, General Tso's chicken, was originally prepared without sugar, and subsequently altered to suit the tastes of "non-Hunanese people." The popularity of the dish has now led to it being "adopted" by local Hunanese chefs and food writers, perhaps as an acknowledgment of the dish's unique status, upon which the international reputation of Hunanese cuisine was largely based. Ironically, when Peng Jia opened a restaurant in Hunan in the 1990s introducing General Tso's chicken, the restaurant closed without success because the locals found the dish too sweet.
New York claim
Peng's Restaurant on East 44th Street in New York City claims that it was the first restaurant in the city to serve General Tso's chicken. Since the dish (and cuisine) was new, Chef Peng Jia made it the house specialty in spite of the dish's commonplace ingredients. A review of Peng’s in 1977 mentions that their “General Tso's chicken was a stir-fried masterpiece, sizzling hot both in flavor and temperature”.New York's Shun Lee Palace
Shun Lee Palace
Shun Lee Palace is a Chinese restaurant located at 155 East 55th Street, between Lexington and Third Avenue in New York City. It alleges to be the birthplace of Orange beef. It opened its doors in 1971. One year later, Shun Lee Palace’s master chef T.T. Wang and partner Michael Tong opened Hunan...
s, East (155 E. 55th St.) and West (43 W. 65th St.) also says that it was the first restaurant to serve General Tso's chicken and that it was invented by a Chinese immigrant chef named T. T. Wang in 1972. Michael Tong, owner of New York's Shun Lee Palaces, says, "We opened the first Hunanese restaurant in the whole country, and the four dishes we offered you will see on the menu of practically every Hunanese restaurant in America today. They all copied from us."
The two stories can be somewhat reconciled in that the current General Tso's chicken recipe—where the meat is crispy fried—was introduced by Chef Wang, but as "General Ching's chicken," a name which still has trace appearances on menus on the Internet. However, the name "General Tso's chicken" traces to Chef Peng, who cooked it in a different way.
Recipes
Though relatively inexpensive to produce, General Tso's chicken is often listed as a "chef's specialty" at Chinese restaurants in North America, commanding a higher price than other items. Traditionally, the dish is made with dark meat chicken such as legs or thighs, however, many higher-end Chinese restaurants use boneless skinless breast meat. The dish has also become a staple of Chinese buffets. Many restaurants, especially in areas with many vegetarians, also serve General Tso's tofuTofu
is a food made by coagulating soy milk and then pressing the resulting curds into soft white blocks. It is part of East Asian and Southeast Asian cuisine such as Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Indonesian, Vietnamese, and others. There are many different varieties of tofu, including fresh tofu and tofu...
or General Tso's veg (soy protein). Other variants sometimes substitute shrimp, beef, or pork for the chicken.
Traditional basic ingredients include:
Sauce: soy sauce, rice wine, rice wine vinegar, sugar, cornstarch, dried red chili peppers (whole), garlic, MSG.
batter/breading: egg, cornstarch.
dish: Broccoli, meat (cubed).
Regional differences
The name used for the dish varies. At the United States Naval AcademyUnited States Naval Academy
The United States Naval Academy is a four-year coeducational federal service academy located in Annapolis, Maryland, United States...
, the dish is served in the main mess hall, King Hall, as "Admiral Tso's Chicken", reflecting a nautical theme. The Pei Wei
Pei Wei Asian Diner
Pei Wei Asian Diner is a restaurant chain in the United States. Owned by P. F. Chang's China Bistro , it offers a modest selection of freshly prepared Asian items influenced by the cuisines of China, Japan, Korea, Vietnam, and Thailand...
chain of Chinese restaurants has a "Pei Wei Spicy" preparation (which can be served with chicken or other types of meat and vegetables). The menu says "our version of General Chu" in parentheses. It is made with "chile vinegar sauce, scallion
Scallion
Scallions , are the edible plants of various Allium species, all of which are "onion-like", having hollow green leaves and lacking a fully developed root bulb.-Etymology:The words...
, garlic, snap pea
Snap pea
Snap peas , also known as sugarsnap peas, are a cultivar group of edible-podded peas that differ from snow peas in that their pods are round as opposed to flat. The name mangetout can apply both to snap peas and snow peas.Snap peas, like all other peas, are pod fruits...
s, carrot."
Outside North America, one notable establishment that serves General Tso's chicken is the Taiwanese restaurant Peng Chang-kuei, which is credited by some sources as the inventor of the dish. Differences between this "original" dish and that commonly encountered in North America are that it is not sweet and sour in flavor, the chicken is cooked with its skin, and soy sauce plays a much more prominent role.
See also
- Sesame chickenSesame ChickenSesame chicken is a syncretic dish, commonly found in Chinese restaurants throughout the English-speaking world...
- Orange chickenOrange chickenOrange chicken is a Chinese-American dish of Hunan origin. The variety of orange chicken most commonly found at American fast food restaurants consists of chopped, battered, and fried chicken pieces coated in a sweet orange-flavored chili sauce, which thickens or caramelizes to a glaze...
- Crispy fried chickenCrispy fried chickenCrispy fried chicken is a standard dish in the Cantonese cuisine of southern China and Hong Kong. The chicken is fried in such a way that the skin is extremely crunchy, but the white meat is relatively soft....
- Chicken Tikka MasalaChicken Tikka MasalaChicken tikka masala is a curry dish of roasted chicken chunks in a spicy sauce. The sauce is usually creamy, spiced and orange-coloured...
, another syncretic dish seen as symbolizing its particular cuisine. - Chop sueyChop sueyChop suey is a Chinese dish consisting of meat and eggs, cooked quickly with vegetables such as bean sprouts, cabbage, and celery and bound in a starch-thickened sauce...
, another dish more popular in North America than in China. - Pizza effectPizza effectThe pizza effect is a term used especially in religious studies for a wide-ranging phenomenon, for instance the process by which cultural exports are transformed and reimported to their culture of origin, or the way in which a community's self-understanding is influenced by foreign sources...
. That is, the phenomenon of dishes which symbolize a particular culture to Americans being then introduced to that culture.
External links
- The Definitive General Tso's Chicken Page
- General Tso's Chicken Recipes on the Web
- “Who Was General Tso And Why Are We Eating His Chicken?” Article from The Washington PostThe Washington PostThe Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
- Exploration of term
- “Hunan Resources” Article from The New York Times Magazine about the origin and propagation of the dish
- The curious history of General Tso's chicken
- All about General Tso's chicken