Better Than Take-Out Instant Pot General Tso’s Chicken
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Enjoy Chinese take-out at home with this recipe for Instant Pot General Tso’s Chicken! This sweet and slightly spicy breaded chicken recipe is a real treat and ready in under an hour (most of which is hands-off cooking time).
We love making Chinese food in our instant pot! It comes out so flavorful and fresh. Plus, it costs a lot less to make it at home. Some of our other favorite recipes are Air Fryer Crab Rangoon, Instant Pot Chicken Lo Mein, Instant Pot Orange Chicken (Panda Express Copycat), and Instant Pot Chicken Fried Rice (Better Than Take-Out!).
What is General Tso’s sauce made of?
The General Tso’s sauce is made of a combination of rice vinegar, hoison sauce, soy sauce brown sugar, ginger, garlic, and red pepper flakes.
Is Instant Pot General Tso’s Chicken spicy?
Yes. This dish is sweet and spicy. It is not overly spice, unless hot peppers are added. We do not include that in this recipe and instead use red pepper flakes to make it just slightly spicy.
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How do you make Instant Pot General Tso chicken from scratch?
(Full printable recipe can be found at the bottom of this page)
- Start by dredging 2-inch chunks of chicken thighs in beaten eggs and then a combination of flour and cornmeal.
- Use your instant pot on saute to fry the chicken in vegetable oil for 5 minutes.
- Mix in the sauce ingredients and stir well.
- Cook on high pressure for 5 minutes.
- NPR for 10 minutes.
- QR remaining pressure.
- Remove the lid and set to saute.
- Mix in a cornstarch slurry and let simmer for 5 minutes.
- Turn off instant pot and let cool, until sauce thickens.
- Serve and enjoy!
What to serve with General Tso’s Chicken?
Serve it with steamed brown rice or vegetable fried rice. Yum!
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Instant Pot General Tso's Chicken Recipe
Equipment
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 pounds boneless and skinless chicken thighs
- 3 large eggs beaten
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 cup corn meal
- 1/4 cup vegetable oil
- 1/3 cup water
- 6 tablespoons rice vinegar
- 6 tablespoons soy sauce
- 6 teaspoons hoisin sauce
- 3 tablespoons brown sugar
- 1 tablespoon minced ginger
- 1 tablespoon minced garlic
- 1/2 teaspoon red chili flakes
- 2 tablespoons cornstarch
- 3 tablespoons water
Instructions
- Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.
- Pat chicken dry and cut into 2-inch chunks.
- Set out two small bowls.
- Add eggs to the first one and whisk until well beaten.
- Add the all-purpose flour and cornmeal to the second and mix.
- Dredge each piece of chicken into the egg first and then into the flour mixture.
- Place coated chicken on the prepared baking sheet.
- Repeat withing reamining chicken until all pieces are coated.
- Repeat steps until all chicken has been coated.
- Press the saute button on your instant pot and wait until the display reads HOT.
- Pour the vegetable oil into the instant pot.
- Add the chicken to the oil and saute for 5 minutes, until golden brown. Turn the chicken as it cooks so it browns on all sides.
- Pour in the 1/3 cup water, rice vinegar, soy sauce, hoison sauce, brown sugar, minced ginger, minced garlic and red chili flakes to the instant pot.
- Stir well, making sure to scrape up any bit of chicken stuck to the bottom of the pot.
- Close the lid and set the pressure release valve to sealing.
- Press the manual or pressure cook button and set to high pressure for 5 minutes.
- Allow the pressure to naturally release for 10 minutes and then release the remaining pressure.
- Once the pressure is fully released, open the lid and stir.
- Press the saute button and bring the general tso's chicken to a simmer.
- Whisk together the 3 tablespoons water and cornstarch.
- Mix the corntarch slurry into the instant pot.
- Let simmer for 5 minutes.
- Turn the insatnt pot off and let it sit for 5 minutes. The sauce will thicken as it cools.
- Serve and enjoy!
So, mine turn out looking anything like any of the pics but I a new to the instant pot world. It ended up looking more like chicken curry (without the yellow) but consistency of curry lol. But my teenage son loved it and he is a picky eater so I still have it full star rating because I’m pretty sure it was operator error. I’m going to keep trying until I get it right. But it is delicious.
I thought this was good. No need for a slurry at the end, it was already pretty thick. But I followed the directions anyway & then it was way too thick. Oh well, next time I know. Also, I would lessen the rice vinegar. It was a bit overpowering in the flavor. But overall we all liked it & will make it again
I agree with the rice vinegar. I made a double batch and it was incredibly overpowering even though I already cut it down knowing how powerful it was going to be. I also added raspberry habanero sauce and lime juice to give it a sweet twist. I am also glad I didn’t do the alert at the end because instead of an egg batter I used flour and cornstarch in the beginning (only I had a proble with it sticking in the pot) but at the end of cooking it was already think. I will be trying to perfect my end of things as I am new to instant pot. But it was a huge hit at my house and that makes it all worth it. Definitely took longer than predicted first time. But worth the wait.
Mine didn’t turn out quite as poorly as some, but it definitely wasn’t great. It lacked the signature crispness. I also had issues with getting the burn warning while it was pre-heating. I did a bunch of scraping and managed to get it to continue cooking.
This turned out awful. Find another recipe
Wow this recipe was ****. I was suspicious the moment I read the ingredients and the cooking method. Why would you put water onto chicken that you fried? It makes it mushy. General Tso chicken is cooked via stir fry. And none of the ingredients would actually give the chicken it’s distinctive red color. I knew from the start that all those sauces combined would turn this into a brown mess. Yet I still gave this a try. I was an idiot.
This is delicious, I’ve used chicken and pork. Both turn out great. You do have to saute the meat in a couple batches. It’s too much to get crisp at one time I also don’t thicken the sauce. I did once and it was way too thick. I would definitely reduce the amount of corn starch is you thicken it.
Note sure how 1.5 lbs is meant to saute in the instant pot. It was mushy and pasty and disappointing.
This was amazing! Im making it for the second time and I forgot to comment last time. I do feel that it was best to put my sauté on Normal and not high so my chicken wouldn’t burn. I read all of the comments stating they burned so I tried that and it was a success! It’s now a favorite in our family, thank you!!!
I followed this recipe as closely as possible. Every time I tried to start the pressure cook, not two minutes later, I would get a “food burn” message. It finally cooked but was a pasty, shredded, flavorless mess. I use the IP constantly and have never had a recipe turn out so bad. Such a shame too because the photo made it look delicious, if that’s an actual photo of what I made. Because it didn’t look like a distant cousin to how this recipe turned out for me.
This recipe has now consumed 2 hours of my life, and my instantpot wouldn’t cook it. No matter what I tried, it just kept burning to the bottom of the pot, and I kept getting the dreadful “burn” message. After opening the instant pot, the food was seared, blackened and burned to a crisp. Forget this recipe, it’s just as cheap and a lot easier to order this as takeout.
It was gross! It burned at first… at 2 mins left. I scraped the pan and tried again… all mushy!!!
Don’t waist the time or ingredients – –
Followed this to a “T” even taking an extra step to remove the chicken and clean the pot before adding chicken back and adding the next ingredients before bringing to pressure.
BURN notice came in before it got to pressure, I deglazed the pot again and added liquid to attempt to save it. Burn notice again.
Salvaged this recipe by going to the stove top.
Worst recipe ever I followed it to the T and the instant pot burn alarm went off. I added more water and same thing happened I had to throw it all away
I had the same exact experience. I use my instant pot constantly and have never had a food burn message or a meal turn out so nasty. It was a pasty mess.
Same exact thing here. I ended up throwing it all out and just ordering chinese takeout