Orange Ground Chicken

The best dishes come from creativity and from using what you have. If theres’s one lesson I try to share about cooking is to “use what you have”! Why? It forces you to leverage all of your resources, eliminates food waste, and it’s a great way to understand flavor! Flavor is always the real test in becoming a pro at this cooking thing and using what you have provides results that help you understand what flavor combos work great together. A substitution here and there could be super delicious!

Like this Ground Orange Chicken recipe! I was craving Orange Chicken from Trader Joe’s, you know the one that you grab in the frozen food aisle?! Well I had this whole meal planned for a quick Saturday dinner. I wasn’t in the mood to order out and that was a quick solve. Until I went in the freezer and there was no Orange Chicken in sight. Such a sad sad experience because when I’m in the mood for something, I just have to have it. At all costs lol.

We were just about due for a grocery haul so we had no chicken breasts. I had to make it work with what I had and what I had was ground chicken. And guess what? It did! And it was soo delicious! It kind’ve reminded me of Panda Express’ Orange Chicken and the Trader Joe’s version combined but with ground chicken.

Ingredients

For the Ground Chicken

• 1 pound ground chicken

• 1/2 teaspoon of garlic powder

• Black Pepper to taste

• 1 inch knob of ginger, finely diced or mashed

• 2-3 garlic cloves, finely diced or mashed

For the Orange Sauce

• 1 inch knob of ginger, finely diced or mashed

• 4 cloves of garlic, finely diced or mashed

• Zest and juice of 1 orange

• 1 teaspoon of rice wine vinegar

• 2 tablespoons of soy sauce

• 1 teaspoon sesame oil

• 1 tablespoon of sugar

• 1/4 teaspoon of crushed red pepper flakes

• 1 tablespoon of oil, for cooking

• 1 cup of water, for cooking

• 2 stalks of green onions (scallions), sliced, as garnish

Cornstarch Slurry

• 1 tablespoon water

• 1 tablespoon cornstarch

Directions

First we season the ground chicken. Add the ground chicken into a medium and season with garlic powder, black pepper, fresh ginger, and fresh garlic. Set aside.

Then, we make our orange sauce. In a medium bowl combine the ginger, garlic, orange zest, orange juice, soy sauce, sesame oil, sugar, rice wine vinegar and crushed red pepper flakes. Whisk until combined. Set aside.

Now, we cook our ground chicken. Add oil to a pan or skillet under medium to high heat. Then, add in yours seasoned ground chicken. Cook the ground chicken while breaking up the larger pieces of meat with a spatula or cooking spoon until you have nice small crumbles. Cook and brown in your pan until the liquid has cooked out of the ground chicken. About 8 minutes.

Then, we add a cup of water to our cooking pan/skillet and cover. Cook until the water cooks out of the ground chicken. About 10-15 minutes.

While the chicken is cooking, combine cornstarch and water to form a cornstarch slurry. Whisk until fully combined. Set aside.

Now, we add in the orange sauce. Once the cooking liquid has cooked out of the pan, add your orange sauce to the chicken and combine. Cook the chicken in the sauce and bring to a boil, this will ensure that the chicken absorbs the flavors in the sauce.

Lastly, we finish the dish by adding the cornstarch slurry. Add the slurry to the chicken in your pan and combine. Cook the chicken for about 1-2 minutes. The sauce will begin to thicken. Once the sauce thickens, garnish your Ground Orange Chicken with green onions and serve!

This dish goes great with a side of white rice, stuffed inside of lettuce cups as an appetizer or even to accompany a salad.