Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Orange Chicken: a yummy recipe (and gluten free too!)


I'm not a food blogger and have no aspirations to be.
Quilts will always be my first bloggy love.

BUT -- I'm a mom and a wife, and I'm always looking for healthy and yummy meals that make the big man, the little (picky) man, and the little lady happy.  I like this one too.

This is modified from a recipe I ate growing up that used two envelopes of Lipton Onion Soup mix instead of these other things I'm listing.  I'm trying to eliminate MSG from my family's life (it's a neuro-specific toxin!*)

I bought the ingredients to make it again this week. :)

Orange Chicken

I apologize that I don't measure.  I kind of don't know how.  I shake 'til it feels right.  No, I do not take that approach with quilts.  This is harder to mess up than a quilt.

orange chicken ingredients

Important -- 
  • Don't reconstitute the juice concentrate!
  • If you can't find pine/orange combo, you can use half a can of orange juice, and half a can of pineapple juice.  The bonus for this is that you have concentrate ready to make this again (which you will want to; I promise).
  • If you put your onion in the freezer for approximately 15 minutes before cutting, it won't make you cry so much while chopping. (thanks Miki!)
  • Bonus: Chicken thighs are inexpensive!  (I've never tried this with breasts; the thighs don't dry out, so that's why we use them.)
  • My dad and hubby grow the "CalRose" kind of rice.  You can find it in the Asian food sections of the grocery store.  Uncle Ben's (and the like) never come in to this house.
  • You can drain off some of the fat on top if you'd like.
  • The sauce is really yummy too.
Here are the super easy directions!

Orange chicken recipe directions

It will look like the picture in the top when it's ready.  And you're welcome.  It's delicious.  I promise. ♥

P.S. A funny story about MSG.  I lived in Taiwan for a year of my life, and learned a lot of basic Mandarin Chinese, including how to request no MSG on the food for my friends and I.  I often got very strong questioning looks (and out-right questions), and this questioning face made more sense to me when I learned the translation of the word.  I was told, the loose translation of MSG in Chinese was "Flavor Pow!" of "Flavor Zip!"  (Picture old Marvel comics bubbles).  No wonder they wondered why I didn't want any.

3 comments:

  1. This looks sooo good! I agree no Uncle Ben's here, just the good stuff!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I bookmarked this one. Thanks so much for sharing, can't wait to try it!

    ReplyDelete

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