It’s called the “Happy Family” in Chinese restaurants, and I would always get it there. It is a delectable stir-fry made with chicken and vegetables. Now I use my indoor barbecue to do this at home.
| Prep Time: | 15 mins |
| Cook Time: | 20 mins |
| Total Time: | 35 mins |
| Servings: | 4 |
| Yield: | 4 servings |
Ingredients
- 3 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves – cut into strips
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 onion, sliced
- 1 red bell pepper, seeded and cubed
- 1 yellow bell pepper, seeded and cubed
- 1 (15 ounce) can baby corn, drained
- 1 tablespoon white sugar
- 1 (16 ounce) package frozen stir-fry vegetables
- 1 cup water
- 1 tablespoon cornstarch
- 1 tablespoon soy sauce
Instructions
- Preheat an indoor grill, and coat with cooking spray. Place the chicken strips on the grill, and cook for about 7 minutes. Allow them to cool slightly, then cut into cubes.
- While the chicken is cooking, heat the oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Place the onion rings in the skillet, and cook for a few minutes. Add the red and yellow pepper, baby corn, and the stir-fry vegetables. Increase the heat to medium-high; cook and stir for about 15 minutes.
- Sprinkle in the sugar and salt. Stir in the chicken. Dissolve the cornstarch in water, and pour into the skillet along with the soy sauce. Cook and stir until the sauce thickens.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 313 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 29 g |
| Cholesterol | 52 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 10 g |
| Protein | 25 g |
| Saturated Fat | 2 g |
| Sodium | 915 mg |
| Sugars | 14 g |
| Fat | 10 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
Iād make it again. I put it over lo main noodles. Could put it over rice. Very tasty and simple!
HORRIBLE RECIPE!!! It has NO flavor, NOTHING like Happy Family. So disappointed!!!
add bit more soy sauce, ginger, red pepper and mushrooms. Great recipe!
I did not use the chicken, just did the stir fry veggies. Made a great side dish for my sticky chicken.
This stir fry is a great base, but be careful because you can easily kill off the delicate flavors and have this turn into a rather bland and boring dish. I highly recommend adding some hoisin sauce for a sweet and smoky addition.
That is a good start. But to have a true happy family you need to add a few things more. You need to have shrimp, scalops and chicken. Also needed is some pea pods along with the veggies. How I make mine is to start with onion, garlic, a little ginger, water chestnuts stir fry together. Add some mushrooms, and green pepper. Remove all items as you fry them in a wok and store them in the wok cover. Stir fry some carrots, and a little celery. removing as they are fried and keep in cover to allow flavors to visit. Stir some mushrooms of your choice and put them in the wok cover then stir fry the chicken, remove to a bowl, add the scalops remove to same bowl, then stir fry shirmp. Add scalops and chicken to wok and continue to heat. Add a mixture of corn starch and chicken broth and bring to boil and let thicken. when thickened, add the items in the wok cover back to make one big happy family. Served over sticky rice. All these flavors are sure happy to be together and they will make one happy family sitting at that dinner table.
Every “happy family” i’ve seen at chinese places has chicken, beef, pork, and some type of seafood…a happy family of different ingredients.
Good easy recipe I’ve made more than once. I’m giving it 3 stars because it’s neither the best nor very exciting to the palate. It tastes good and easy to keep the ingredients on hand. Look for a bigger bag of stir-fry veggies that includes bell peppers and baby corn and you’re don’t even have to spend the time cutting/opening cans of those.
um um good I love the combination of stir fried veggies and chicken nice with rice and a good addition to a healthy diet I love Chinese food so naturlly I love this very delightful
As written, this was completely bland and boring. However, with a lot more soy sauce, a little sesame oil, and a generous glug of Hoison sauce, this wasn’t bad at all. A few sliced mushrooms don’t hurt either. Thanks!
This turned out OK with some tweaking. I first sauted my chicken breasts in black bean sauce. I added some minced ginger and garlic to the veggies. Left out the corn and added pea pods and sliced carrots. I also threw in some BokChoi (sp???) Was pretty yummy though.
As written, I thought this dish lacked flavor. Like Kez, I marinated my chicken and needed to add a lot more spices. I also used some garlic chili paste and a bit of oyster sauce. My Quality Cook friends and I make a dish together once a week and the recipe title seemed appropriate for our happy cooking family! Good base, but it really does require some tweaking. Thanks!
Very good will be a favorite
I made some changes to this. I marinated the chicken overnight in a mixture of oil, honey and soy sauce. I chopped my own stir fry veggies and used fresh baby corn and added some garlic and chinese five spice. The sauce didn’t thicken that much so I added a little more cornstarch. A very quick and easy weeknight meal. Thanks.
We thought that this was a pretty goos stirfry. I added minced garlic, some Emeril’s Asian Essense and water chestnuts. The flavor was great. We had it over rice. I also made egg rolls to go with it! Thanks for the quick recipe!
This is a very quick and easy recipe. When I barbeque, I now add 3-4 chicken breasts, cut them up and store in fridge because I make this recipe about every 8 days. Very good!
Not only is it tasty,it’s also quick and easy to prepare when you want a quick meal.
This meal did not taste to us as typical chinese, but we enjoyed it. We did not add any baby corn and peppers because we used stir-fry deluxe, which has peppers and baby corn already in. Yummy and easy! My husband did the main part of cooking š
This was a great dish, one of the best Chinese meals I have made…easy to make. I was worried when it called for sugar, but it worked. I put mine over rice. It will become a favorite recipe
Good start, but lacked flavor. Maybe garlic? I’ll try that next time along with fresh veggies, as the bag had lots of broccoli stems and carrots and little else.
This was excellent but it does need a little more spice to it. Maybe 5 spice or something. I still think it deserves five stars though. It is very authentic.