Hello! hi everyone, Wesley here. Today we're diving back into our series dedicated to Japanese comfort food classics with a shot at what I would describe as my personal favorite form of the chicken sando, which is the Japanese chicken katsu sandwich. What makes the katsu sando so uniquely superior to all other forms of the chicken sando? Great question! I'm so glad you asked. The katsu sando as you may have guessed, most prominently features the Japanese chicken katsu, which is a breaded and fried piece of chicken breast coated in egg and panko, served with a side of the American influenced "tonkatsu sauce," and placed between two pieces of the softest bread known to man, which of course is the Japanese milk bread, or shokupan.

As with any sandwich, the katsu sando can be found served with a variety of different veggies and accompaniments to go along with your fried chicken. In my opinion though, the simplest solution here is also the best version of this sandwich, which is a simple side of shredded cabbage. Finally perhaps the most important piece of this equation that makes this sandwich superior to all other sandos (nashville, i'm looking at you), is the shape and form of our chicken cutlet, which is iconically butterflied and flattened before frying. This yields for us what I would call, the only chicken sando that logistically has a structural soundness to it, so it doesn't completely fall apart when you eat it. Hope you try it.

 

Yields 24oz

INGREDIENTS

  • 2-3 medium chicken breasts

  • 4 cloves garlic

  • 1 inch (about 1 tbsp) ginger

  • 1/4 head cabbage

  • corn starch slurry (2 tbsp corn starch dissolved in water)

  • shokupan (Japanese milk bread)

  • kosher salt

  • 64oz fryer oil

  • peanut oil

INGREDIENTS (breading)

  • 1/2 cup AP flour

  • 1 cup panko breadcrumb

  • 2 eggs

INGREDIENTS (tonkatsu sauce)

  • 4 tbsp low sodium soy sauce (or 2 tbsp full sodium soy sauce)

  • 1 tsp dark soy sauce

  • 1 tbsp mirin

  • 1 tbsp black vinegar

  • 1 tbsp oyster sauce

  • 2 tbsp ketchup

PREP

  • CRUSH and mince the garlic, set aside

  • FINE MINCE the ginger, set aside

  • SLICE the cabbage, set aside

  • COMBINE all sauce ingredients, set aside

  • BUTTERFLY the chicken breast, then flatten with a mallet

  • WHISK the eggs, then place the panko and AP flour in separate bowls and season each with kosher salt

  • DREDGE the cutlets in AP flour first, followed by egg, then panko

ON THE STOVE

  • HEAT the fryer oil to 350F, then fry the cutlets until golden brown, rotating every 30 seconds

  • REMOVE the fryer oil, reheat the wok as hot as possible, add 4 tbsp peanut oil and long yao

  • ADD the garlic and ginger, then bloom for 15 seconds until fragrant

  • ADD the sauce mixture and reduce over low heat for about 1 minute

  • ADD the corn starch slurry and simmer for 1-2 minutes until a thickened sauce forms

  • COAT the shokupan with tonkatsu sauce, followed by shredded cabbage, chicken katsu, and optionally additional sauce

  • SLICE in half on the diagonal

 

tagged chicken katsu,katsu sando,katsu sandwich,fried chicken,fried chicken sandwich,japanese fried chicken,japanese food,japanese cooking

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