isithalal.food · Recipes

Halal char siu chicken

Cantonese-style char siu made with Halal chicken thighs instead of pork shoulder, marinated in hoisin, red bean curd, soy sauces, garlic and honey without the Shaohsing wine, then roasted and glazed.

Chinese · Main · Easy · 3 portions · 335 min

Each method follows published technique for the dish, and every Halal substitution is checked against the ingredient pages we cite. Photographs come from our ingredient library rather than the finished dish.

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Why Halal checks matter here

Char siu is Cantonese roast pork, and the marinade adds Shaohsing rice wine, a Chinese cooking wine, along with jarred red bean curd and soy sauces to check.

Halal-critical ingredients

• Pork shoulder: Char siu is traditionally pork, and the published recipe uses pork shoulder steaks. Pork is Haram. Use Halal chicken thighs, as here. See Pork and Chicken.
• Shaohsing rice wine: The published marinade adds 1 tsp of Shaohsing rice wine, a Chinese cooking wine. This site does not treat alcohol cooked into a dish as Halal. Leave it out, as here.
• Red bean curd, soy sauce and hoisin: These are fermented or jarred sauces. Brewed soy sauce is accepted by many scholars for its trace alcohol, but added alcohol or mirin changes that. Read each label for added alcohol, rice wine or mirin. See Soy sauce.
• Oyster sauce: The source suggests oyster sauce as an alternative to hoisin. Scholars differ on oyster sauce because it follows your school on molluscs. Stick with hoisin, or follow your school. See Oyster sauce.

Ingredients

Chicken and marinade

• enough for 3 Halal boneless chicken thighs (instead of 3 pork shoulder steaks)
• 2 tbsp hoisin sauce
• ½ cube red fermented bean curd from a can, plus 3 tsp sauce from the can
• ½ tsp light soy sauce
• ½ tsp dark soy sauce
• 2 garlic cloves, finely grated
• 6 tbsp honey (3 tbsp for the marinade, 3 tbsp for basting)

To serve

• to serve cooked jasmine rice
• to serve steamed pak choi
• 1 spring onion, finely sliced

Method

1. Make the marinade. Whisk the hoisin, red bean curd and its sauce, both soy sauces, the garlic and 3 tbsp of the honey together. Leave out the Shaohsing rice wine.
2. Marinate. Tip half the marinade into a large bowl with the Halal chicken thighs, keeping the rest for basting. Season, toss to coat and chill for 5 hours.
3. Roast and baste. Heat the oven to 200C/180C fan/gas 6. Put the chicken in a roasting tin and roast for 30 minutes. Mix the remaining marinade with the other 3 tbsp honey and brush it over the chicken every 10 minutes so it colours evenly.
4. Check and serve. The published time is for pork shoulder steaks, so cut into the thickest thigh to check it is cooked through, with no pink, and give it a few minutes more if needed. Serve with rice and pak choi, with spring onion scattered over.

Allergens

soy (bean curd, soy sauce, hoisin), gluten (soy sauce)

How this recipe was researched

Method adapted from BBC Good Food's 'Cantonese char siu' by Maggie Wong (serves 3: 3 pork shoulder steaks; marinade of 2 tbsp hoisin, half a cube of canned red bean curd with 3 tsp of its sauce, ½ tsp each light and dark soy sauce, 1 tsp Shaohsing rice wine, 2 grated garlic cloves and 3 tbsp honey; half used to marinate the meat for 5 hours; roasted at 200C/180C fan/gas 6 for 30 minutes, brushed every 10 minutes with the rest of the marinade mixed with 3 tbsp more honey). We replaced the pork with Halal boneless chicken thighs, left out the rice wine, and marked the bean curd, soy and hoisin as label checks. Chicken thighs are our substitution; the published roasting time is for pork shoulder steaks, so check the chicken is cooked through. Timings follow the published technique rather than a kitchen test.

Photograph from our ingredient library: a roast chicken, not the finished dish from this recipe.