Chicken in Phoenix Nest

Recipe from Lawrence C.C. Chu

The Phoenix, which represents beauty and grace, is properly remembered in the presentation of this dish. Cubes of plump chicken nestle in a lacy basket made of shredded potatoes. Green pepper, slices of carrot, and delicate quail eggs are a colorful and surprising addition.

Yields:

4-6 servings

Time Required:

• 30 mins. cooking time

Ingredients:

• 1 lg. russet potato
• Pinch salt
• 1 broiler-fryer chicken (about 2 ½ lb. = 1.15 kg), boned, skinned, and cut into bite-size pieces

Marinade

• 2 tsp.¹ (10 mL) light or regular soy sauce
• 2 tsp. (10 mL) dry sherry
• 1 egg white
• 1 Tbsp. (8 g) corn starch (US/Canada), aka cornflour (UK/other)²
• 1 Tbsp. (15 mL) vegetable oil

• ½ tsp. corn starch (US/Canada), aka cornflour (UK/other)²

• Vegetable oil, for deep-trying

• 2 green onions (white part), finely chopped
• 1 clove garlic, sliced

Sauce

• 2 Tbsp. (30 mL) soy sauce
• 2 Tbsp. (30 mL) Hoisin sauce
• 1 Tbsp. (15 mL) dry sherry

Vegetables

• 1 green pepper, seeded and cut into 1" (2.5 cm) squares
• ¼ white onion, cut into 1" (2.5 cm) squares
• 6 thin slices carrot
• Dash sesame oil
• 5-6 quail eggs³
• Shredded lettuce or bok choy

Preparation:

Needed: 2 medium-size wire strainers⁴.

Peel potato and shred; place in a bowl of water, add salt and let stand until ready to use.

Combine chicken with MARINADE ingredients in the order listed, and let stand for 10 mins.; set aside.

Drain potatoes thoroughly, and toss with the ½ tsp. corn starch. Heat 2 qts. (1.9 L) oil in a wok to 350°F (175°C).

To shape, dip the 2 identical strainers into the oil, to prevent sticking. Distribute half the potatoes evenly around the sides and bottom of one strainer. Press the other strainer down into the potato-lined one.

To deep-fry, holding the strainers tightly together, carefully lower them into the oil, and rotate so that oil touches all the sides. Deep-fry for 3 to 4 mins., basting if necessary, until potato nest becomes slightly brown. Remove from oil, gently separate strainers, and tap nest out onto a paper towel to drain. Repeat, using remaining potatoes.

To oil-blanch, remove 1 qt. (945 mL) oil (reserve for future use), and heat remaining oil to 300°F (150°C).

Add chicken, stirring to separate, and blanch for 2 to 3 mins. Remove and drain.

Combine SAUCE ingredients, and set aside.

To stir-fry, remove all but 3 Tbsp. (45 mL) oil from the wok, and, when hot, add onion and garlic. Stir-try until fragrant, and then add VEGETABLES and chicken. Cook for 1 min.; stir in SAUCE. Continue cooking and stirring for 1 min. longer, then stir in sesame oil and drained quail eggs.

To serve, position potato nests on top of platter lined with lettuce. Fill each nest with half the chicken mixture, carefully keeping quail egg on top.

Cook's Notes

I've always been bemused by the instruction (concerning onion or especially garlic) of cooking "until fragrant". I mean, dude, when's garlic not fragrant? That's what aliums do.

¹ Quarts, pints, cups, tablespoons, teaspoons, and fl. oz. are as defined in US Customary Units, not to be confused with differing British imperial, "legal", "coffee", Commonwealth of Nations, Canadian, Latin American, Japanese, Russian, or Dutch definitions — further proof that everyone needs the metric system.

² "Corn starch" is powdered starch processed from the New World grain maize (from Spanish, orig. from Nahuatl), which grain the USA/Canada call "corn", unlike the rest of the English-speaking world, which reserves "corn" to mean cereal grains generically. This starch product, needed here in its customary role as a thickening agent, is called "corn starch" in the US/Canada, but "cornflour" in the UK and most other anglophone lands — not to be confused with whole maize grain: That product — not a thickening agent — is called "polenta", "corn meal", or "corn flour" in the US/Canada, depending on how finely milled, and called "maize flour" in the UK and most other places. Australians should beware that their "cornflour" is starch extracted from wheat kernel, sometimes more-helpfully labelled as "wheaten cornflour". As if that weren't confusing enough, the maize-based thickener may be labelled (in Australia) either as "corn flour" or as "corn starch", so beware. Further, the maize flour product, there, is labelled as "cornmeal".

Note that whole-maize grain is traditionally, in Meso-American cultures of origin, wisely soaked in alkaline solution ("nixtamalised") to increase bioavailability and thereby prevent niacin deficiency (pellagra), among other important benefits, yielding "masa" (lit. dough) aka "masa de maíz" (lit. maize dough), also available in dried & ground form as "masa harina" (lit. dough flour) aka "harina de maíz" (lit. maize flour), and in its unground form, hominy. As further complication, Americans distinguish "corn flour", meaning prepared from maize endosperm only, from "maize flour" for use of whole maize — the former, neutral-flavoured; the latter, much more nutritious.

Origin of the naming mess: Originally, North America shared with Mother England the language's original meaning of "corn" to mean cereal grains generically (from Old English "corn" meaning single seed of any cereal plant, orig. from Proto-Germanic "kurnam" meaning small seed). The colonists got the gift of maize from native peoples, therefore at first calling it "Indian corn". Later, in the USA and Canada, "Indian corn" got worn down to just "corn", while the original meaning of "corn" was lost, locally. "Maize" is thus now the least-ambiguous term in international contexts, though many Americans either don't know that word or reserve it for variants from Latin-American (and Spanish) cooking.

³ Perhaps, like me, you never thought of looking around for fresh quail eggs. Odds are, they're findable in any modestly well supplied supermarket's refrigerator section (or, failing that, in East Asian markets), and you just never noticed. While working on formatting this recipe, I finally noticed them at Costco Warehouse.

Like chicken eggs, they're unpasteurised, and therefore must be cooked to avert food safety risks.

⁴ "Medium wire strainers" are obviously not ingredients, yet Chef Chu listed these essential cookware items, there. His description of what's needed is lacking, so: Judging from his photo (page 73) of the finished dish, these two identical strainers should each be a steel part-spherical strainer about 4" (13 cm) across, with a long handle for safer handling around hot oil.

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Taken from: Lawrence C.C. Chu's classic cookbook Chef Chu's Distinctive Cuisine Of China, page 72, published 1980 by Harper and Row, which can be checked out in scanned format at Internet Archive. Thank you! (Chu's the chef / restaurateur of beloved local restaurant Chef Chu's, in Los Altos, California.)

Collected and re-published at http://linuxmafia.com/~rick/recipes/chicken-in-phoenix-nest.html by Rick Moen <rick@linuxmafia.com> on Oct. 3, 2026. Individual recipes are free from copyright. Share and enjoy!

(If I have any copyright title in my own very minor contributions to this page — not my intention — they were created in 2026 by Rick Moen <rick@linuxmafia.com> and licensed for use under CC0. I have thereby waived all copyright, compilation copyright, and related or neighbouring rights to this work. This work is published from: United States of America.)