Orange Chicken

Well, I have not gotten much more wedding stuff accomplished since I mailed out the save the dates. I really am planning on posting instructions on how to do them once I am certain most of our guests have them...so, in the meantime: I've been cookin!

I am absolutely infatuated with the website allrecipes.com. It is the most incredible collection of recipes out there...it is so well organized and easy to use that sometimes I will go on there, type in a couple ingredients that I want to work with and it will recommend specific recipes that I can create. Other times, I get random cravings and so I'll go on, look it up and it pulls up any and all recipes for said craving. The website also provides rankings by people who have cooked it, photos of their achievements and comments on what they did (if anything) to make the recipe better. It is quite possibly my favorite site on the internet.

The other night, Josh and I were craving Chinese so I logged on to check out recipes for orange chicken. This is the one I found and it was soooooooooo good. Like seriously, Josh took one bite and said, "we are NEVER ordering Chinese food again!" So without further adieu:

Orange Chicken

Ingredients:

Part 1. Sauce: 

1 1/2 Cups water
2 T orange juice  

1/4 C lemon juice

1/3 C rice vinegar (I didn't have any, so I just used plain white vinegar and it turned out great) 

2.5 T soy sauce

1 C brown sugar

1/2 t. minced garlic

1/2 t. minced ginger (Again, didn't have it so I just left it out)

2 T chopped green onion 

1/4 t. red pepper flakes

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3 t. cornstarch

2 T warm water

Part 2. Chicken:

1 lb. boneless, skinless chicken breast, cut into bite size pieces

1 C all purpose flour

Salt and Pepper to taste

3 T olive oil

Directions:

1. Combine water, orange and lemon juices, vinegar and soy sauce in a sauce pan set over Med-High heat. Mix in brown sugar, garlic, ginger (if you're using it), onions and pepper flakes. Bring to a boil. Remove from heat and cool 10-15 minutes.

2. Place chicken pieces into a Ziploc bag. When sauce mixture has cooled, pour about a cup of it into the bag with the chicken. Reserve the remaining sauce and marinate the chicken at least an hour, or up to overnight. 

3. In a new Ziploc bag, mix the flour, salt and pepper. Add marinated chicken pieces, seal and shake the bag to coat. 

4. Heat the olive oil in a large skillet over Med heat. Brown the chicken pieces on both sides. Drain on a plate lined with paper towels and cover with aluminum foil while you prepare the sauce.

5. Wipe excess olive oil out of the skillet and pour in the reserved sauce. Bring to a boil over Med-High heat. Mix cornstarch and water in a separate container and then add to the sauce, stirring constantly until it is dissolved. Lower heat to Med-Low, add chicken pieces and simmer 5 minutes until sauce is thick and chicken is coated.

***This recipe sounds messy, but it was super easy. We just served our orange chicken over steamed white rice and it was delicious, sweet and spicy and perfect! Try this recipe, you will not regret it!*****