Will using home-made tomato sauce instead of egg, work for Fried chicken?

Title: Homemade Tomato Sauce as an Egg Substitute for Fried Chicken?

I’m experimenting with a popcorn chicken-style dish and weighing my options. Would love to hear your thoughts!

Option 1: Marinate the chicken in just salt, garlic, and black pepper for an hour. Then, coat it with my homemade tomato sauce (made with sunflower oil, tamarind, and garlic) before dredging it in a mixture of flour and cornstarch. Let it rest for 10 minutes before frying.

Option 2: Marinate the chicken directly in the sauce and then coat it in flour and cornstarch. I’m also considering adding an egg to this option.

Thanks in advance for your feedback! 😄

Edit: It worked! While it wasn’t exactly like KFC or Karaage, it turned out really crispy without using egg. Unfortunately, I can’t share a picture here, but you can check out the Reddit link: https://www.reddit.com/u/One_Independent_4675/s/dHecaHZLQR.

Flavor-wise, the tomato sauce was a game-changer—way more delicious than KFC! I ended up using larger pieces of chicken since I couldn’t debone them myself.

Marinade Ingredients:
– Chicken
– Dried oregano
– Dried basil
– Chili flakes
– Red wine vinegar
– Plenty of soy sauce
– Salt
– Turmeric
– Red chili powder

Marinade Steps:
– Refrigerate for 2 hours, then let it sit in the sauce for an additional hour after removing the initial marinade.

Tomato Sauce Recipe:
– Mustard oil
– Onion
– Garlic
– Tomato puree
– Tamarind
– Curry leaves (optional)
– Hing
– A bit of the previous marinade
– Red wine vinegar

Sauce Steps:
– Sauté onions until browned, then add garlic and the other ingredients.

For the Second Marinade:
– Cook onion and garlic paste for 10 minutes, as I felt my sauce needed extra flavor.

Finally, I coated the chicken with equal parts cornstarch and all-purpose flour. Let it sit for 20 minutes before frying.