Orange Chicken

(Jean’s Post)

There is a cute small Chinese restaurant near my home called Bamboo Garden.  It’s family run and the food is fresh.  My husband and parents discovered it after we moved into our new house that had no microwave or stove for several days.  My husband enjoys the food but always complains about the chicken to coating ratio in any of the fried chicken dishes like orange chicken, sesame chicken, or general tso chicken.  For him, there is just too much coating and not enough chicken.  There began my quest to make a healthier and a better chicken to coating ratio orange chicken.

Bamboo Garden makes a delicious super gooey orange sauce that includes orange rind.  I diverge with a thinner sauce and swap a deep fried for a pan fried chicken (despite my father’s objections).  This recipe is my twist on a Panda Express Orange Chicken copycat recipe from Buttercream Barbie.  Her sauce was a little too much like a sweet and sour sauce for me.  So I amped up the soy sauce and reduced the vinegar content.  Plus I increase the sauce ingredients, as my hubby loves extra sauce.  Yes, he orders it that way from Bamboo Garden too.

What you need…chicken

2 pounds boneless skinless chicken breast
salt
black pepper
1-2 large eggs, beaten
½ cup cornstarch
2-3 tablespoons canola oil

How to…chicken

1. Cut chicken into chunks.  Season with salt and pepper.  Dip and coat each chunk with beaten egg.  Coat each chunk evenly on all sides with cornstarch. Helpful hint.  To speed up the egg coating, dump chicken chunks into a bowl with beaten egg and stir to coat.  To speed up the cornstarch process, in one layer, place all of the egg coated chicken chunks on one plate and using a tiny wire sieve, dust cornstarch onto chicken, flip and repeat.
2. Heat oil in a large frying pan and fry coated chicken chunks (in one layer) till cook thoroughly and golden brown.  Remove from heat, and stir into orange sauce.

What you need…sauce

¼ cup + 2 tablespoons soy sauce
½ cup white vinegar
¼ cup + 2 tablespoons orange juice
2 tablespoons sake
1 cup sugar (I substitute splenda here)
1 tablespoon canola oil
2 tablespoons fresh minced ginger
4 cloves garlic, minced
½ teaspoon crushed red pepper
2 tablespoons rice wine
½ cup water
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1 teaspoon sesame oil
½ cup sliced green onions
sesame seeds

How to…sauce

1. In a small bowl, whisk cornstarch and water.
2. In another bowl, whisk together soy sauce, vinegar, orange juice, sake, and sugar.
3. Heat canola oil in sauce pan.  Add ginger and garlic and stir fry for 10 seconds till it is fragrant.
4. Toss in red pepper, and rice wine and quickly stir for 10 seconds.
5. Pour in orange juice mixture, stir occasionally and bring to a boil. 
6. Reduce heat to a simmer.  Whisk cornstarch mixture.  Quickly whisk the sauce as you pour in the cornstarch mixture avoid lumps.  Continue to stir sauce as it thickens.
7. When it is thick enough, remove sauce from heat and stir in sesame oil.
8. Add pan fried chicken and coat.  Stir in green onions.  Serve and top with sesame seeds.

I like to serve mine with white rice but as before, it tastes great with fried rice too!  Enjoy!

To see more images about coating chicken in egg and cornstarch, take a peek at our sweet and sour chicken blog (Coming soon).