recipe: crispy orange hoisin chicken

[photo credit]

In my constant quest to pin chicken recipes, I found this one on pinterest and made it last night.  It's a good one, although as you can see in the title of the recipe it's called Crispy Orange Hoisin chicken.  And I totally forgot the Hoisin when I was at the grocery store.  So this recipe turned into Crispy Orange-toss-in-whatever-asian-condiments-I-have-in-the-frig-Chicken was still quite tasty. Next time I'll have to remember the Hoisin for a new twist.  Here's the original recipe - with my changes in italics.

Preheat a baking pan in a 425 degree F oven.

·       4 large boneless, skinless chicken breasts cut in thick strips (about 4 or 5 per breast)

·       1 egg + 2 tbsp water whisked together to make an egg wash

·       Combine


o   1 cup flour

o   ½ tsp black pepper

o   ¼ tsp cayenne pepper

o   1 tbsp ground ginger

o   1/2 tsp ground nutmeg 

o   1 tsp salt

Dip the chicken pieces in the flour mixture, then in the egg wash then dredge them again in the flour mixture. Place on a lightly oiled baking sheet and lightly drizzle or the tops with a little more peanut oil. Bake at 425 degrees F for about 20 minutes. Flip the pieces at half way through the cooking time. While the chicken is baking, prepare your sauce.

·       3 cloves minced garlic

·       3 tbsp peanut oil (I used canola oil.)

Heat peanut oil in a wok over med-high heat. Quickly add the garlic and stir fry for only about a minute. (I don’t have a wok.  I just used the biggest pan we have.)

To the wok add 2 cups orange juice.

Simmer to reduce the orange juice volume by half before adding all at once

·       1/2 cup  Hoisin sauce (I forgot to pick this up from the store therefore, it wasn’t in our version.)

·       4 tbsp rice wine or Chinese cooking wine (I didn’t have this either)

·       3 tbsp rice wine vinegar (or apple cider vinegar in a pinch)

·       6 tbsp brown sugar

·       2 tsp chili paste (optional or to taste or use chili flakes to taste)

·       4 tsp soya sauce (I have no idea what soya sauce is…I assumed this was soy sauce and tossed that in.)

·       2 tsp toasted sesame oil

·       1/2 c. Sweet Ginger-chili sauce (this was my substitution to the hoisin sauce)

Bring to a boil and thicken with a slurry of 2 tsp corn starch dissolved in 1/4 cup cold water. Toss in:

·       1 diced red pepper

·       1 cup sliced button mushrooms (optional)

·       1 cup steamed snow peas (I didn’t have any of these either.)

·       1 cup broccoli steamed

Toss in the baked chicken pieces. Serve over rice or Chinese noodles.