Chop Suey is a delicious Chinese dish that’s perfect for using up leftovers. Made with chicken, broccoli, and baby corn tossed in sauce.
A favorite item on most Chinese food takeout menus, Chop Suey has become a classic Chinese-American dish over the years and a delicious Dinner Recipe you can make at home. For more Chinese restaurant favorites, try Easy Sesame Chicken and 3-Ingredient Orange Chicken.
Sabrina’s Chop Suey Recipe
This is the perfect recipe to cut down on your time in the kitchen, even more, you can make the recipe with leftovers. The next time you have cooked Rotisserie Chicken or Baked Chicken in your fridge, you can skip cooking the meat and instead slice the leftovers and toss them with the vegetables and sauce.
Recipe Card
Ingredients
Chop Suey Sauce:
- 2/3 cup low sodium soy sauce
- 1/2 cup chicken broth
- 1/3 cup mirin
- 1/4 cup hoisin sauce
- 1 tablespoon sugar
- 1 tablespoon sesame oil
- 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
- 4 cloves garlic , minced
- 1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
- 2 tablespoons cornstarch
- 1/3 cup water
Chop Suey:
- 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
- 2 chicken breasts , cut into thin bite sized slices
- 1/2 cup chicken broth
- 2 cups broccoli florets
- 8 ounces canned bamboo shoots , sliced and drained well
- 8 ounces canned water chestnuts , sliced and drained well
- 15 ounce canned baby corn , drained well
- 1 zucchini , cut into 1/2" thick half moons
Instructions
Chop Suey Sauce and Chicken:
- In a medium bowl whisk together soy sauce, chicken broth, mirin, hoisin sauce, sugar and sesame oil.
- In a skillet add the vegetable oil and chicken on medium high heat in batches.
- Sear the chicken for 2 minutes on each side.
- Remove the chicken from the skillet, set aside.
- Add in the garlic, stir and cook on medium-high heat for 30 seconds.
- Add the sesame oil mixture to the pan and bring to a boil.
- Simmer for 1 minute then whisk together the cornstarch and water and add it to the pan.
- Bring to a simmer and cook for 1 minute until thickened.
To finish:
- Add chicken broth, broccoli, bamboo shoots, water chestnuts, carrots, baby corn and zucchini to a pan that you have a lid for on medium heat.
- Cover and steam for 4-5 minutes.
- Remove lid, let chicken broth cook off and add the chicken and stir fry sauce to the pan.
- Toss to combine, garnish with green onions or sesame seeds.
Nutrition
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Table of Contents
About this Recipe
This genius recipe is the perfect meal that you can toss together when you don’t have time to cook. The delicious homemade sauce makes the chicken and vegetable stir fry super flavorful without a ton of work or prep time, and you can cook everything on the stovetop. The classic Chinese cuisine will have you feeling like you went to your favorite restaurant, but you don’t have to worry about the lines, prices, or waiting for delivery.
Ingredients
- Mirin: This is a traditional ingredient in a lot of Chinese cuisine, and it adds a lot of umami flavor to this sauce recipe. It’s similar to sake, but mirin is sweeter and has less alcohol. The alcohol also cooks out of the dish.
- Hoisin Sauce: If you haven’t tried hoisin sauce before, it has a strong flavor that balances salty and sweet. The thick, brown sauce is similar to American BBQ sauce, but it’s much saltier.
- Red Pepper Flakes: Along with the rich umami taste of the sauce, adding red pepper flakes is the perfect way to bring some spice to this recipe. You can always add more or less depending on your spice tolerance.
- Cornstarch: Adding a cornstarch slurry (cornstarch and water mixture) to the sauce thickens it into a rich, sticky consistency perfect for coating the stir fry ingredients.
- Vegetables: Use fresh produce for the broccoli florets and zucchini in this recipe. The fresh food has a much brighter flavor and crisp texture than frozen veggies would. You’ll also add canned veggies like water chestnuts, bamboo shoots, and baby corn. Be sure to drain the canned vegetables well before adding them to the mixture.
- Chicken Broth: Steaming the vegetables in broth instead of water adds a more savory flavor to the dish. It also helps the vegetable flavors to blend together into a cohesive taste.
- Chicken: For the chicken, this recipe uses chicken breast. However, you could use boneless, skinless chicken thighs if you prefer dark meat.
What to Pair With
- Typically this dish is served in a bowl over rice or noodles. Steamed White Rice is an easy filling side, and the rice will soak up the flavor from the stir-fry sauce. If you prefer noodles, rice noodles or egg noodles make a good base for this recipe.
- To complete your meal, you can serve this stir-fry dish with your other favorite Chinese food dishes. Side dishes like Egg Rolls, Crab Rangoon, or Chow Mein go great with this recipe.
How to Store
- Serve: Don’t leave this chicken recipe out at room temperature for more than 2 hours at a time.
- Store: If you have leftovers, let it cool. Then you can transfer the chicken and vegetable stir fry to an airtight container to store in the fridge. The recipe can keep well for 3-4 days.
- Freeze: You can also seal the recipe in a freezer-safe container to store in the freezer for up to 3 months. Let the meal thaw in the fridge before reheating it on the stovetop.
Frequent Questions
Chow Mein is made by cooking vegetables, chicken, and noodles in one pan. On the other hand, for Chop Suey, you’ll cook the chicken and vegetables separately. Then if you want to serve the dish over rice or noodles, you just add the Chop Suey over the top before eating.
Although there’s not a direct translation, “Chop Suey” likely comes from the Cantonese word “shap sui.” It means “mixed pieces,” which makes sense considering the dish is really made by combining odds and ends from the kitchen. It’s the perfect recipe to use up leftover chicken and vegetables before they go bad.
Although this is a common dish on any Chinese food takeout menu, its cultural history didn’t necessarily start in China. This is more like Chinese-American cuisine. There are a few stories of the exact origin of this now-popular Chinese food order. First, a Chinese diplomat had his chef prepare the meal as something inspired by Chinese cuisine that would suit his American guests’ tastes. Another is that it started in a San Francisco-based Chinese restaurant when the owner combined the day’s leftovers into a dish to serve his last customers. Possibly the most likely theory is that Chinese immigrants created the dish based on a classic Cantonese recipe tsap seui.
Variations
- Vegetables: You can add so many delicious vegetables to this recipe. Along with the mix already included in the ingredients, some delicious add-ins are bean sprouts, carrots, sugar snap peas, mushrooms, bell pepper, white onion, cabbage, or cauliflower florets.
- Meat: You can swap out the chicken in this stir fry dish for different kinds of meat. Use pork tenderloin for a delicious pork recipe. If you want to make this into a seafood dish, you can cook shrimp and mix it in.
- Vegetarian: If you prefer leaving meat out of your diet, you can use tofu for the protein in this recipe. Press the tofu to remove as much liquid as possible. Then chop it into bite-sized pieces and sear in oil to crisp up the tofu before adding it to the sauce recipe. Replace the chicken broth with vegetable broth, too.
- Seasonings: You can slightly alter the taste of the sauce by adding ginger, onion powder, cayenne pepper, or cloves.
Related Recipes
Favorite Chinese Chicken Dishes
Pictures from previous posts:
I’m confused as I always thought chop suey was a dish made with bean sprouts. Is this a different spin on the recipe?
You’re right Rose! Lots of versions of Chop Suey recipes to try. This is a Chinese-American favorite. Let us know what you think!
Directions for the sauce are partially mixed up. Chicken sautéing is written in for the sauce portion. Happy accident.
Going to make this next week!
Whole family LOVES your recipes!!! If I prepare a new meal or old favorite, saying it’s from Dinner Then Dessert, or saying ‘Its one of Sabrina Snyders recipes”, everyone knows it will be delicious!!!
Thank You Sabrina!!!
It would be helpful for people to know what they can substitute for mirin, which can be hard to find. I plan to use dry sherry.