Hot and Spicy Chicken Manchow Soup is a popular Indo-Chinese cuisine with its place of origin in China. The recipe here is a hot and spicy soup with added Indian flavors, made with chicken and vegetables and served with fried noodles.


Chicken Manchow Soup is a brown soup prepared with vegetables and chicken, corn flour, and flavored with generous doses of different sauces and chili peppers. Usually served with crispy dry noodles.

Available in almost all restaurants though it be small or big and also at roadside food carts. In India, it is believed to be started in Meghalaya.

It doesn’t matter though. We just want to enjoy the delicious soup, especially in the monsoon or winter season. Getting cozy under a blanket, watching your favourite show, and having your fill of this exceptional comfort soup.

In China, street hawkers serve Chicken Manchow Soup in a different way. They throw in the ingredients you ask for to make it suitable to your taste. Hence, you can say it is more custom-made there.

What You’ll Need For Chicken Manchow Soup?

This soup, like most Chinese recipes, will have loads of veggies and includes abundant chopping. Hence the preparation will be longer and slightly lengthy. But once you get that out of the way then it is so much easy.

To make this soup, you will need chicken. Duh! The breast part is absolutely best for use here because we need boneless chicken pieces which you’ll get from that part. If not, then you can use chicken wings for the broth.

However, you might need to remove the bones after boiling if the part used is not from the breast. Boiling the chicken is important to get the chicken stock/broth for making the soup. If not, then you can cook the minced chicken along with the sauteed ingredients in the wok.

As for the other ingredients, we will have ginger, garlic, and green chillies, finely chopped/minced. Most people do not like it when they experience big pieces of these in their mouth so they are to be chopped as fine as possible. I personally don’t mind that, especially with the green chillies. I just love the spice.

The same goes for vegetables. Cabbage, carrots, and bell peppers (mostly green) are commonly used. Some people even add a little bit of chopped tomato. If you like to have some crunch then you can roughly chop them or have big pieces. Otherwise, cut them small.

Lastly, you need salt & pepper for seasoning and Chinese sauces for the flavours. You can adjust the amount of them as per your taste.

Preparing Fried Noodles

Without the fried noodles this soup is incomplete. You can get them from the store if available. But if not then this can easily be prepared at home.

First of all, boil/cook the noodles as per the instructions on the noodle package. Remove the noodles from the water and rinse them in cold water to stop boiling. Once done drain them completely. Sprinkle some cornflour on the noodles to remove excess moisture and get a crispier texture.

Heat oil in a pan and deep-fry the noodles until they turn golden brown/crispy. Remove them and let them cool. Serve with the soup later.

Tips:

  • If you are using minced chicken and cooking it then keep stirring or else the chicken will clump up and form a big lump.
  • Adding chicken stock will give a better flavour. But if you do not want that then you can add hot water as well.
  • The soup may turn into gravy if you store it with the usage of cornflour. therefore, it is better to consume this fresh and not later.
  • To balance the overpowering sauce you can add a little bit of sugar. Also, add some green chilli paste for some extra spice and heat. Sometimes, even white pepper powder is also added.
  • We are not using eggs in this recipe but most recipes do contain that. If you want to add that then beat the egg and add it to the soup after the cornflour slurry. Do not stir immediately after and let the egg strands thicken a bit.
  • Skip the chicken and this will be a vegetarian option. You can add more vegetables like mushrooms, tofu, red onions, beans, and corn to the soup.

Other related recipes:

Chinese Chicken Cutlet

Fried Chicken Wontons

Chilli Chicken Gravy

Veg Manchurian

Chilli Chicken Open Toast

Veg Hakka Noodles