Karaage

Karaage is a Japanese cooking technique in which various foods—most often chicken, but also other meat and fish—are deep fried in oil. The process involves lightly coating small pieces of the meat or fish with a combination of flour and potato starch or corn starch, and frying in a light oil. The foods are marinated prior to coating. The process differs from the preparation of tempura, which is not marinated and uses a batter for coating. Karaage is often served alone or with rice and shredded cabbage. When the main ingredient is coated with starch instead of flour, the dish may be called tatsuta-age (竜田揚げ). The first references to a style of frying called karaage (then written as 空揚) were in the Genroku period at the end of the 17th century. Chicken karaage was popularized as a "Chinese-style" restaurant food (using the characters 唐揚) in the 1930s. There exists considerable disagreement among newspapers and publishers in Japan about the preferred kanji, leading some to write it phonetically as からあげ.

Source: Wikipedia