This Mongolian Chicken recipe is sure to become a new favorite in your home. The ease of cooking this dish and how the flavors turn out will make you second-guessing about getting Chinese takeout again.
Making dinner at home saves so much money, and the leftovers taste even better. We also love to make Sweet and Sour Chicken, Pepper Steak and Chipotle Barbacoa at home when we are craving takeout.
What is Mongolian Chicken?
Similar to its Mongolian beef counterpart, Mongolian chicken is a Chinese-American favorite; hence, why you’ll find it on every Chinese restaurant menu. Whether chicken or beef, the Mongolian sauce brings flavorful life to the entire dish.
While traditional Mongolian chicken dishes call for one vegetable (green onions), adding others such as broccoli, bell pepper, or even sliced carrots has become common. It’s also familiar to pan fry it; however, it turns out just as flavorful in the slow cooker.
Recipe Ingredients
- Chicken breasts – boneless skinless chicken breasts are easier to dice into cubes.
- Chicken coating – made from a combination of cornstarch, baking soda, salt, red pepper flakes, and black pepper. Baking soda is a tenderizer.
- Sauce – this classic sauce is made with water,chili garlic sauce, rice wine vinegar, hoisin sauce, brown sugar, garlic, ginger, white onions, and sliced red chili pepper.
- Vegetables – broccoli adds both flavor and texture to this yummy meal.
- Optional toppings – staying true to Chinese cuisine, red chili pepper slices, green onions, and sesame seeds can be used to garnish the finished dish.
Step-by-Step Directions
Prep for this dish by dicing the chicken breasts, onion, mini sweet red pepper, thinly slicing the ginger, and chopping the broccoli into florets.
Step One – Combine the chicken coating mixture and add the diced chicken in a small bowl.
Step Two – Stir the chicken in the coating mixture until each piece is well covered.
Step Three – Combine the chopped pepper, onion, minced garlic cloves, and ginger in another bowl. Then pour the Mongolian sauce on top.
Step Four – Stir the chopped vegetables, spices, and Mongolian until everything is mixed well.
Step Five – Add chicken.
Step Six – Mix everything together until combined well.
Step Seven – Add all of the combined ingredients to the slow cooker.
Step Eight – Cook on low for 4.5 hours.
Step Nine – Stir in broccoli florets and cook an additional 30 minutes (on high).
What do I serve with this?
- Steamed white rice is often a go-to choice when ordering this dish from a Chinese restaurant. You could also go for fried rice.
- Kung Pao noodles – Having many of the same ingredients as the Mongolian chicken, these noodles make a great pair to complete this dish. Not to mention, the sour-sweet soy sauce adds an extra kick.
- Sesame noodles – If you’re looking for a side that won’t overpower the flavor of the Mongolian chicken, then adding a helping of sesame noodles is an ideal choice.
- Stir fry veggies – Since there’s already broccoli in this recipe, adding more stir-fry-style veggies would go perfectly. These veggies often include bell peppers, sugar snap peas, baby corn, and onions.
Variations
- A little more heat: If you’d like to increase the heat to your slow cooker Mongolian chicken recipe, try 3-4 tablespoons of Asian sweet chili sauce and 1-2 teaspoons of sriracha. Use more or less of each ingredient according to the amount of heat you want.
- Tweak the flavor: Adding brown sugar will give your dish a sweeter taste, while adding Asian sweet chili sauce will give it a sweeter and spicier kick. Siracha adds pure spice.
- Add more veggies: Besides the broccoli, you can add just about any veggie your heart desires. Stir fry veggies offer a good combination, or you could go all out with zucchini, mushrooms, asparagus, and/or cauliflower.
Recipe FAQs
Transfer your leftovers to an airtight container and store them in the refrigerator. They will keep for up to 5 days. To reheat, heat a skillet over medium heat and add the leftovers. Cook and stir until warm throughout. Add a little water to make it saucier.
Absolutely. Make sure they are boneless and skinless to make the dicing process more manageable.
You put this entire recipe (except the broccoli) in a ziplock bag and freezer for later cooking. You’ll want to add the fresh broccoli at the end of the cooking time, instead of freezing.
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Slow Cooker Mongolian Chicken Recipe
Equipment Needed:
Ingredients:
- 1 lb boneless skinless chicken breast
- 2 Tbsp. cornstarch
- 1 tsp. baking soda
- 1 tsp. salt
- 1/2 tsp. red pepper flakes
- 1/2 tsp. coarse black pepper
- 3/4 cup water
- 2 Tbsp. rice wine vinegar
- 2 Tbsp. chili garlic sauce
- 1/2 cup hoisin sauce
- 2 Tbsp. brown sugar
- 3 garlic cloves minced
- 1" piece ginger root thinly sliced
- 1/2 cup diced mini red sweet peppers (or red bell pepper)
- 1 small white onion diced
- 4 cups broccoli fresh or frozen (frozen thaws quickly in the slow cooker)
Optional toppings
- 2 red chili peppers sliced (mini sweet bell peppers)
- 2 tsp. sesame seeds
Instructions:
- Cut chicken breast into cubes. Add to a large mixing bowl and toss with cornstarch, baking soda, salt, red pepper flakes, and black pepper.
- In a separate mixing bowl, combine water, rice wine vinegar, chili garlic sauce, hoisin sauce, brown sugar, garlic, ginger, white onions, and sweet red peppers. Whisk, then pour into the bowl with chicken and toss to coat.
- Add ingredients to the slow cooker. Cook on low for 4.5 hours.
- After the 4.5 hours is up, stir in the broccoli florets. Cook an additional 30 minutes on high.
- Garnish with remaining red chili pepper slices, green onions, and sesame seeds. Serve with rice and enjoy!
Recipe Notes:
- A little more heat: If you’d like to increase the heat to your slow cooker Mongolian chicken recipe, try 3-4 tablespoons of Asian sweet chili sauce and 1-2 teaspoons of sriracha. Use more or less of each ingredient according to the amount of heat you want. Sriracha adds pure spice.
- Tweak the flavor: Adding brown sugar will give your dish a sweeter taste, while adding Asian sweet chili sauce will give it a sweeter and spicier kick.
- Add more veggies: Besides the broccoli, you can add just about any veggie your heart desires. Stir fry veggies offer a good combination, or you could go all out with zucchini, mushrooms, asparagus, and/or cauliflower.
Nutrition Information:
Nutrition info is auto-generated. This information is an estimate; if you are on a special diet, please use your own calculations.
I’m interested in trying this recipe as is, but I’d also like to try it using beef. What changes to the recipe would you recommend and what cut of beef do you think would work best?
I would use cubed beef stew meat or cubed chuck roast.
Is the chili garlic sauce being used for spicyness or for flavor? I am planning on making this soon. My 11 year old doesn’t like spicy yet but he likes a lot of flavor. I’m worried that if I omit the chili garlic sauce to make the dish non spicy, that it will also decrease the flavor. Any suggestions? Thank you!!
Hi! It’s hard to say without testing it. Maybe use sweet chili sauce instead.
I love this recipe and make it a lot. I was wondering if I could make it without chicken though? Can I make just the sauce and vegetables and how would I cook it?
I don’t see why not. Maybe whisk the cornstarch in with the sauce and skip the baking powder.
This came out amazing! The only changes I made were I doubled the sauce for using 1.77lbs of chicken and I also didn’t have Huy Fong Chili Garlic, but I did have their Sambal Oelek. I would recommend NOT doubling that unless you like it hot. I’d keep it at 2 Tbsp. If you have a problem with it being too spicy, take some sugar and sprinkle a teaspoon or 2 over it, stir and let it cook for a few minutes and taste again.
I also used an entire head of fresh broccoli and even used 8oz of mushrooms because I had them and thought why not? Since I doubled the sauce ingredients, the extra veggies worked wonders at sucking up the sauce.
I’ve absolutely saved this in my Recipes Bookmark Folder! Along with the Short Rib Ragu recipe using gnocchi. That is restaurant worthy!!!
We really enjoyed this recipe and my husband asked me to add it to our rotation!
My crockpot runs hot (newer ones seem to do that, it’s aggravating) so I cooked on low for about 3 hours, then added the broccoli and peppers for the last 30 minutes on high. Chicken was cooked just right and it tasted great! There weren’t any leftovers for lunch the next day but that’s a good problem to have. 😉
I m sure it’s delicious. Over20 ingredients. No thank you. I’ll eat out.
It’s 18 ingredients, and many of the ingredients are pantry ingredients.
The sauce is not nearly as dark as in the picture, did i do something wrong?
If you don’t have hoison sauce on hand what can you use instead?
Hoisin is hard to replicate. Here is a recipe for it. https://www.crunchycreamysweet.com/hoisin-sauce/. Sorry I’m not much help.
Made this with 1.5lb of chicken, so multiplied the ingredient amounts by 1.5 except for garlic which I multiplied by about 2.
Waited until the last 30 minutes on high to add bell pepper and broccoli, which made them a perfectly acceptable texture. Also added 3 de-seeded serrano peppers with everything at the beginning, which gave it a nice spice.
I just realized it said frozen broccoli instead of fresh. I added fresh broccoli florets to the crockpot at 4 hours in. How long do you think I should cook it for?
At this point you can just keep checking it, it will be totally fine! Probably the same amount of time, depends on how you like your broccoli.
Can I omit Hoison and red pepper flakes from, the chinese dishes
since I do not enjoy this type of heat in my food? Thank you.
Yes you can omit.
Hoison is not spicy. It’s the crucial ingredient for this dish imo after trying it.
Great recipe, thank you!❤❤