Here is my interpretation of the traditional Korean fried chicken sauce. I like to cook this dish for a shorter period of time and add a lot of green onions and garlic. The outcome is a sauce with those ingredients slightly more prominent in the flavor profile. If you can, try to locate Korean chili paste or flakes. If you can’t find them, any hot chili flakes or paste would work. I’ve used them before and they had a terrific flavor (and are obviously more real).
| Prep Time: | 10 mins |
| Cook Time: | 5 mins |
| Additional Time: | 30 mins |
| Total Time: | 45 mins |
| Servings: | 6 |
| Yield: | 6 servings |
Ingredients
- ½ cup ketchup
- 2 green onions, minced
- 4 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 lemon, juiced, or more to taste
- 2 tablespoons honey
- 1 tablespoon chile-garlic sauce (such as sambal), or to taste
- 1 teaspoon red pepper flakes, or to taste
- ½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper, or to taste
- ¼ cup water, or as needed
- 1 pinch salt, or to taste
Instructions
- Whisk ketchup, green onion, garlic, lemon juice, honey, chile-garlic sauce, red pepper flakes, and black pepper together in a saucepan over medium-high heat; add enough water to reach desired sauce consistency. Bring sauce to a simmer; reduce heat to medium-low, and simmer until thick and flavors blend, about 5 minutes. Cool to room temperature and season with salt.
- Everything in this recipe is to taste, so adjust until you think it’s balanced between sweet, sour, and spicy.
- Serve with
- .
Reviews
I sautéed the onions and garlic because I wanted them to be cooked, I didn’t have chili paste so I used a sweet and sour sauce, I added a little bit of sugar, oyster and Worcestershire sauce, then followed the rest of the recipe and added fried chicken strips at the end. the sauce turned out great!
Okay, this was really good for fried chicken, but hear me out: what about for fried…dumplings? Korean fried chicken dumplings?!?
So good with the Korean Fried Chicken! Just spicy enough to get your attention, it is just the two of us, so I had enough for 2 meals. Green beans, rice and salad. We were stuffed! P.S. – don’t forget, you need to marinate chicken in spices ( I almost forgot). I did it for 4 hrs. Thanks Chef John for another keeper.
We’ve never had Korean Fried Chicken before, so I don’t know how this stacks up against that flavor, but we put this sauce on super crispy oven baked chicken thighs and it was really good. We’ll use this sauce on to dip our momo in in the future too. Loved it.
Love me some sweet and sour sauce… and this is above and beyond that in flavor. Not as sweet which I love. Balance of flavors are on point. Once again Chef John nails it!
Tastes like weird spicy ketchup. But my kids liked it, so yay.
I cut down on the heat of the sauce and added some chopped carrots.
The sauce was So good! The chicken was really good, definitely crunchy. I didn’t marinade chicken long enough, but it was still really good! I’ve made a number of Chef John’s recipes and everything is always delicious!
I made this as written:-). Spicy for my taste, but it was suggested to season to taste:-). I will try again. I am disappointed that “helpful” critical detail, was made by someone who DID NOT make it.. That really isn’t helpful.
My family and I loved this sauce. I am allergic to onions and garlic so left them out. It was still very good on the Korean Chicken
fast, great flavor and really enjoyed it
A lot of work, but very good. I don’t have a fancy fryer like he does. I have a Fry Daddy, but chose to cook on the stove, because I can regulate the temperature better. My first batch wash’t great. The batter came off on a couple of pieces and there was a sticking issue, so I added a little more oil That solved the problem. Overall. a great dish. Try it for sure, but I don’t think I’ll do it again real soon. The sauce was really good. Don;t make this without doing the sauce. Even if you don’t use it all in this recipe you can put in another dish.
Wowee. This was spicy good. Served over Chef John’s Korean Chicken. Fantastic meal.
No changes to the original recipe and will definitely make this again.
Hot hot hot! Loved the bite. Served it with the suggested chicken on top of mashed potatoes. I think the starch helped manage the heat a bit. This will be a repeat recipe for us, but it’s not for those who don’t care for spicy. You’d have to change it up quite a bit to lose the heat.
Really good and easy to make. Good on the Korean Fried Chicken and any thing else you need a REALLY hot sauce for. I made it by the receipt , but by adding less hot pepper flakes you could cool it down. I loved it just the way it was and will make again!!!
Really good and easy to make. Good on the Korean Fried Chicken and any thing else you need a REALLY hot sauce for. I made it by the receipt , but by adding less hot pepper flakes you could cool it down. I loved it just the way it was and will make again!!!
Very nice
Make to your own taste – really good!
Another winner from Chef John, thank you. My only suggestions are as follows: if you know you like HOT, HOT, then the 1 tsp of red pepper flakes will be ok. We like hot and spicy and about 1/4 tsp is perfect. If you are not sure, start with a small amount of red pepper flakes. Also, if your garlic and green onions are diced very fine you will be happier, I think, with the end result and the melding of flavors. I have made this so frequently that I don’t measure a thing. As Chef John says, this recipe is all about your taste so adjust accordingly. If this tastes like ketchup you did something wrong – it is a perfect sauce for the Korean fried chicken. I also serve a cooler dressing that I make – a bit like ranch – that goes so well with the spicy red sauce. OMG this is so good. Again, thank you for sharing.
Not anything like any of the Korean fried chicken sauces I’ve tried or made