If you’ve been to San Diego, CA, hopefully you’ve been to Royal Mandarin and had their famous Salt and Pepper Chicken Wings. These wings are addicting. This crunch fried chicken has a wonderful blend of garlic flavor, salty, and spicy.  It’s like the Pringles theme, “Once you pop, you can’t stop.”  These wings have been nicked named “Crack Chicken” by local San Diegans.

I like to serve this as an appetizer at my dinner parties.

Here is my recipe that serves 2-8 people (depending on how many pieces they want to eat):

• 2 lbs of chicken wings/drumettes
• 1 whole head of garlic minced
• 1/2 bunch of  chopped scallions
• 1 1/2 tsp. of red chili flakes (more or less depending on your spice level)
• 1 1/2 oz. of Shaoxing wine
• 12 oz of cornstarch
• 8 oz of cold water
• and as much MSG as you would like to flavor your chicken
• Peanut oil

1. Add water in a bowl with wine, and corn starch. Mix until a batter forms.
2. Add chicken to batter. Let chicken soak in batter.
3. Heat up peanut oil enough to deep fry the chicken.
4. You will need to fry your chicken in batches until golden brown. Drain chicken on paper towels.
5. In a separate pan, heat up oil in a pan.
6. Saute garlic until fragrant. add chili flakes, and green onions.
7. Once mixture is heated through,  toss chicken in the garlic and onion mixture.
8. Once chicken is coated with mixture, season chicken with MSG.