calherewecome

So, inquiring minds want to know. Who was General Tso and why did he have a chicken dish named after him? I was having a conversation with my daughter-in-law Theresa about Chinese food (of the American variety) in general and General Tso’s chicken in particular.

According to Wikipedia, General Tso probably refers to Tso Tsung-t’ang who was a Chinese statesman and military leader in the late Qing Dynasty. He was born in 1812 and died in 1885.

He served in China’s northwestern regions, quelling the Dungan revolt and various other disturbances. There doesn’t seem to be any particular connection to him. The roots of the dish seem to lie in the post-1949 exodus of Chinese chefs to America. So the answer is no, the General did not actually eat this excellent dish.

Here’s the full Wikipedia entry on General Tso’s Chicken.

Now for some of the recipes. There are tons of recipes to be found. Here are just a few. (Click on the hyperlink).

From Food.com

From Allrecipes.com

From SeriousEats.com

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This entry was posted on February 23, 2015 at 1:31 pm and is filed under Cooking, Recipes. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments.

Tags: Chicken, Chinese Food, General Tso