It's a beautiful day for frying, my friends.
Chase and I realized that the wok is the perfect tool for frying anything, from bacon to breaded chicken. The sides of the wok are very high, so you're less likely to get splattered and burned. The wok also holds a good deal of oil with plenty of space between the oil and the rim, reducing the kind of splashing you get with skillets. All in all, consider this another shameless promotion of the magical wok.
However, if you don't have a wok, this recipe can be made in a deep skillet, or deep fryer if you happen to have one. The other day I watched my friend Theresa fry chile rellenos in a skillet to great and delicious success. If you can do it with giant peppers, you can certainly do it with bite-sized chicken.
Chase and I created this recipe when we were craving some Chinese-style Orange Chicken, but wanted something a little, well, different. So we decided to fry the chicken once with a simple flour coating, and the second time covered with cornbread mix. The cornbread gave the chicken a sweet, thick coating. It was so tasty!
If you want to make a more traditional Orange Chicken, skip the cornbread coating and second frying. Chase and I tried a couple of chicken pieces with just the flour coating, and they were crispy and delicious. We just went the extra Oklahoma mile to deep fry twice.
Last point, this Orange Sauce is delicious. We made a couple of modifications to our personal taste: we left out the red pepper flakes, added extra orange zest and used the green onion as garnish instead of as part of the sauce. As always, our mods are in the recipe below. The sauce turned out to be great on many other dishes too! We made a vegetable stir fry and topped it with this sauce. It would be great on non-Chinese dishes too. I bet any pork chop would shine with a dollop of orange on top.
Happy cooking!
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Double-Fried Orange Chicken
Orange Glaze
1 ½ cups water
2 Tbsp orange juice
Juice of one lemon (about ¼ cup)
⅓ cup rice vinegar
2 ½ Tbsp soy sauce
Zest of one orange
1 cup packed brown sugar
½ tsp finely chopped ginger
1 clove garlic, finely chopped
3 Tbsp cornstarch
¼ cup water
Directions
1. In a large saucepan over medium heat, combine 1 ½ cups water, lemon juice, orange juice, rice vinegar and soy sauce. Stir until blended.
2. Stir in brown sugar, orange zest, ginger and garlic. Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer.
3. In a small bowl, combine cornstarch and ¼ cup water. Stir until thoroughly mixed.
4. Stir cornstarch mixture into sauce until it thickens.
5. Serve sauce over your dish.
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Double-Fried Chicken
1 lb skinless chicken, cut into bite-sized cubes
1 cup all purpose flour
1 box Jiffy cornbread mix
¼ - ½ tsp salt
¼ - ½ tsp pepper
3 eggs
3 cups vegetable oil (will vary based on your cooking pan)
3-4 Tbsp chopped green onion
Prepared jasmine rice
Directions
1. Pour vegetable oil into a wok or a deep pan and begin heating to medium-high to high heat.
2. In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, salt and pepper. In a small bowl, beat one egg.
3. Dip chicken pieces into egg, then flour.
4. Once oil is hot, place chicken pieces into the oil, adding them one at a time. Do not over load your pan, as this will cause sticking. We had about 3 or 4 rounds of frying.
5. Fry the chicken until the pieces float and are browned, about 3-4 minutes. Remove and place on a paper towel to drain.
6. Continue to fry your chicken in batches until all are done.
** If you want a more traditional Orange Chicken stop here and top with orange sauce!**
7. Once the flour round of frying is done, pour Jiffy mix into a large mixing bowl. Beat remaining 2 eggs in a clean bowl.
8. Dip chicken pieces into egg, then roll in Jiffy mix. This round, you'll want to bread your chicken in batches, so the original flour breading doesn't get soggy in the egg.
9. Fry your first round of corn-breaded chicken until golden brown and crispy (about 2-3 minutes this time).
10. Repeat corn-breading and frying until all chicken is double-fried.
11. Serve over jasmine rice, topped with Orange Sauce and garnished with green onion.
Prepped for the first round of breading.
Chicken hiding in flour.
You'll know your oil's hot enough if you get a strong bubbling right away.
Chicken after Round 1. Stop here for more traditional Orange Chicken.
Fried to a corny golden crisp.
Sauced and garnished. Happy cooking!
