Tiny Spicy Chicken and Homemade Sambal Chili Paste

I love reading recipes, they give me ideas and inspiration...especially when I'm in a rut.  I found this recipe for tiny spicy chicken and knew I had to try it.  It was an easy conversion for our diet...the only problem was I didn't have any sambal chili paste in my house, and I'm trying to be good and only go grocery shopping once a week.  So, what was I to do?  Well, I went looking for a recipe to make it and I happened to have the ingredients or at least equivalents of the ingredients, so I made my own chili paste and we had our tiny spicy chicken.  The chicken wasn't as spicy as it could be, I toned it done so our kids would eat it, so add more chili paste if you want more heat.

Tiny Spicy Chicken

1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into chunks and sprinkled with garlic salt
1/4 teaspoon garlic salt
1/2 cup cornstarch
1 egg
canola oil


Combine the garlic salt and cornstarch in a bowl.  In a separate bowl beat the egg.  Heat oil to 350F.  Dip chicken in the egg and then in the cornstarch, and fry until golden brown. Place chicken in a 9x13 pan and cover with sauce (recipe below).  Bake at 375F for 45 minutes, stirring every 15 minutes.

Sauce:
1 cup sugar
1 cup white vinegar
1/2 cup ketchup
2 teaspoons coconut aminos or gluten-free soy sauce, if you can have soy
1/2 cup chicken broth
1 teaspoon (or more) Sambal chili paste (homemade recipe below)
1/4 cup brown sugar

Combine ingredients in a saucepan and bring to a boil, cook until sugar dissolves.

Sambal Chili Paste (adapted from here)
1/4 cup sugar
1 small onion, chopped
2 tablespoons white vinegar
1/2 cup dried Thai or Japanese chilies
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1/4 water
1/2 teaspoon salt

Combine all the ingredients in a food processor, and blend until smooth.  Place the mixture in a saucepan and cook over medium heat until the mixture has reduced to ~1/2 cup.  It should take about 10 minutes.