Spicy Chicken Stew or Dakdoritang is a one-pot stew that is perfect for when you just want a spicy and comforting meal.
Yes, you read it right. This stew is one pot. As long as you’ve prepared all the ingredients and chopped up all the vegetables, you can literally just throw them all in the pot, let it cook, and you’re done.
What part of chicken to used in Dakdoritang?
For dakdoritang, it is more common to use a whole chicken cut up into small pieces to make the dish. However, I prefer using only the thigh and leg part bone-in so it remains juicy. Bone in is a must because as you boil, the sauce of the stew becomes tastier.
Parboiling for about 5 minutes on high heat is also traditionally done to cook this dish. You have to throw out the water from the first boil and rinse the chicken to remove excess fat and blood from the skin and bones.
No, you’re not throwing out the flavor! As long as there are bones in the chicken, the flavor will still come out as you simmer them.
Ingredient List and How to Make Dakdoritang
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For the vegetables, you will need potatoes, carrots, onions, scallions, and jalapenos. The potatoes are a natural thickener, the carrots are natural sweeteners, and both of them are great with the sauce. The onion and scallions, on the other hand, give amazing flavor to the dish. If you want extra spice, put jalapeno, otherwise, it’s optional.
Some of the spices you need to add to the chicken stew may be specific to Korean cuisine. You may need to pull up on the nearest Hmart, Asian grocery, or even Amazon to find them. But honestly, this Korean Spicy Chicken Stew recipe is worth the try especially if you want to switch up the way you cook chicken!
- Korean Red Pepper Paste or Gochujang. This paste is very specific to Korean cooking. It’s spicy, it’s savory, and it is highly essential to the dish.
- Korean Red Pepper Powder or Gochugaru (Coarse & Fine). Yes, two kinds of textures for the pepper powder because one adds more spice without making the dish too savory and the other gives it a beautiful color.
- Soy Sauce. Use light or regular soy sauce. This will act as the salt and also add umami to the dish.
- Sugar. This will balance out the spice from the pepper, pepper paste, and pepper powder.
- Corn Syrup. This is also a sweetener to balance the spice, but it also makes the sauce a bit thicker and more succulent.
- Mirin. This is sweet cooking wine that will also help make the sauce into a beautiful glaze.
- Sesame Oil. Use toasted sesame oil. We will only use a small amount to complement the spice, sweetness, and umami from all the other ingredients.
Literally, a spoon is all you need to get this going. Once you throw all these vegetables and sauce ingredients in the pot, you can leave it and just go back to check and stir a few times. This is what makes it the best chicken stew recipe: All the protein and vegetables are in one pot!
Make plain white rice or multigrain rice while you’re waiting, because that’s the perfect pair for this dish!
To make it even simpler, you can make a big batch of this chicken stew recipe for meal prep. You can also make it ahead for any lunch or dinner for your family. The chicken becomes tastier as it soaks in all that spicy sauce!
Other Korean stews you may like:
- Korean Braised Shortribs
- Korean Braised Oxtail
- Spicy Soondubu Jjigae
- White Soondubu Jjigae
- Gochujang Jjigae
Make sure to leave a rating, a comment, or tag me on Facebook, Instagram, or Tiktok when you chop them up! Yeobosayo!
Korean Spicy Chicken Stew (Dakdoritang)
Ingredients
- 2 lbs Chicken Leg or Thigh Bone-in
- 2 1/2 cups Water
- 1 pc Potato Chopped to bite size
- 60 grams Carrots Chopped to bite size
- 2 pcs Jalapeno Cut in half (Add according to spice tolerance)
- 2 stalks Scallion Cut in 2-3 inch pieces
Dakdoritang Sauce
- 1 1/2 tbsp Garlic
- 1/2 tbsp Ginger
- 1 1/2 tbsp Korean Red Pepper Flakes or Gochugaru (Coarse)
- 1 1/2 tbsp Korean Red Pepper Powder or Gochugaru (Fine)
- 5 tbsp Korean Red Pepper Paste or Gochujang
- 7 tbsp Soy Sauce
- 3 tbsp Corn Syrup
- 2 tbsp Sugar
- 1 tbsp Mirin
- 1/2 tbsp Sesame Oil
- Black Pepper To taste
Instructions
- In high heat, parboil your chicken for 5 minutes. Drain then rinse in cold water afterward.
- In a deep pot put water, boil, and place the chicken back in. Put potatoes, carrots, onion, and jalapenos as well. Give it a good mix.
- Add the garlic, ginger, pepper flakes, pepper powder, pepper paste, soy sauce, corn syrup, sugar, mirin, sesame oil, and black pepper. Give it a good mix.
- Let it cook on medium-high heat for 25 minutes. Add the scallions in the last 5 minutes.
- It will be ready once everything is fork-tender.
- Serve with rice and enjoy!
Chef Chris, thank you for sharing this Dakdoritang recipe! It sounds so delicious and I’m very excited to try it! I eat a plant-based diet, so I bought everything that I needed to make a vegan version of this recipe. However, I cannot find anything on the level of spiciness of this dish anywhere online. Is Dakdoritang mildly spicy, medium spicy, or melt-your-face-off spicy? Can the level of spice be adjusted? First, I want to make Dakdoritang the authentic way, except I will be using plant-based chicken instead of real chicken. Then, I want to make Dakdoritang where I add more vegetables to it like diced white or yellow onion, diced celery, or whatever. I love cooking everything from scratch, using the freshest organic ingredients. I love a wide variety of vegetables, textures, colors, and flavors. I am not Korean, I am just an adventurous home chef who loves to make delicious dishes from all around the world and I would love to learn more about Korean cuisine. I try to cook every recipe as healthily as possible too. Any suggestions or recommendations for additions or adjustments? Thank you very much!💜😽💋
Whassup Katfish! You can substitute whatever you like in this recipe. As for the spicy level, that’s adjustable too. The more spicy you like it, the more pepper you put in. I don’t have any suggestions as far as the recipe to make it healthier? You could possibly add organic ingredients.
My husband and I tried your recipe the other night and it came out bomb. This is our new go-to dakdoritang recipe. Looking forward to trying out your other recipes! 🙂
Ayyy!!! So glad you enjoyed the recipe!!!
Great recipe, really tasty. Easy to put together. Had to adjust the heat. 1st time using the paste and the flake. Very Tasty!
Wow! Thank you!! So happy to hear that you like the pepper paste and pepper flakes even if it’s your first time using it. More recipes on the site using those two ingredients, hope you try them out too!