I was asked to make something asian inspired that didn't use any soy. I love orange chicken and I happened to come across a sack of mandarin oranges at the market. I love mushrooms, peppers, and broccoli so I added them to this recipe. It is delicious and pretty healthy. In order to keep the soy out of this dish, I used coconut aminos to bring the umami you usually get from soy sauce. I hope you enjoy this dish as much as I do.

Ingredients

Sauce

2 T coconut aminos
1 T vinegar
1 tsp sambal oelek
1 T garlic
1 T ginger
1 tsp sesame oil
1 T Brown sugar
Zest from a mandarin orange (optional)

3/4 c orange juice
1 T cornstarch

Chicken

4 egg whites
1 T cornstarch
2 large chicken breasts

Vegetables

2 crowns of broccoli
1 red bell pepper
4 small jalapeños
1/2 lb mushrooms, sliced

Olive oil for sautéing
Peanut oil for frying
Salt & Pepper to taste

Notes

You could use chicken thighs if you prefer.

If you don't want to deep fry your chicken, you could pan fry it. Deep frying gives a richer crust to the chicken for the sauce to stick too.

The jalapeños don't add much to the heat of this dish, but the sambal oelek does. You can adjust the amount to accommodate your palate.

Directions

Mise-en-place

Wash the produce.

Cut the florettes off the broccoli crowns. Set aside in a large bowl.

Chop the stems of the broccoli. Add to a different large bowl.

Remove the stems, veins, and seeds of the peppers.
Large dice the red bell pepper. Add to the broccoli stems.
Small dice the jalapeños. Add to the same bowl.

In a medium bowl, add 1 T cornstarch to the orange juice. Whisk well.
Add the garlic, ginger, coconut aminos, sambal oelek, sesame oil, vinegar, brown sugar, and orange zest.

In a large bowl, separate your egg whites. You won't need the yolks for this recipe.
Whisk in 1 T of cornstarch to the egg whites.

Rinse your chicken and pat dry with paper towels. Dice into 1-inch cubes. Add to the egg white mixture. Mix the chicken into the egg white mixture until the chicken is well coated. Set aside.

Cook

In a large skillet, heat up some olive oil over medium-high heat and sauté the peppers and broccoli stems. Stir occasionally. Salt and pepper to taste. Peppers are pretty resilient and taste great as they heat up. If they char a little bit, that's okay. Just don't burn them.

In a dutch oven, heat up 2-3 inches of peanut oil to 350℉. If you have a deep fryer, use that. If you don't have a thermometer, you can check to see if the oil is ready by CAREFULLY letting a single drop of water hit the oil. If it pops, it's ready.

Slowly add one piece of chicken at a time to your frying oil. This keeps the chicken pieces from sticking to each other. Don't over crowd your pan; cook the chicken in batches. Let fry for about 5 minutes or until golden brown. Remove from the oil and drain on paper towels.

Alternatively: You can pan fry the chicken in a large skillet over medium high heat. Add enough oil to coat the bottom of the pan. Be careful of oil splatter as you add the chicken. After a few minutes the chicken should release itself from the pan and you can flip it with tongs. You'll do this in several batches. Multitask accordingly. Drain the chicken on paper towels.

Once the peppers are cooked, remove from the pan and add to a large bowl.

In the same pan you cooked the peppers, sauté your mushrooms. If the pan is dry, add some more olive oil. You probably won't have to since the peppers don't absorb much of the oil. Add to the peppers once cooked.

In a medium sauce pot, add the orange juice mixture you made earlier. Cook this over medium heat until it slowly comes to a boil. Reduce the heat to low and let it thicken. Stir often so it doesn't stick or burn.

In the pan you cooked the mushrooms and peppers, add a splash of orange juice (or water) and the broccoli crowns. Cover and steam the broccoli for about three minutes or until bright green.

Toss the chicken with your orange sauce.

Enjoy!

Serve this over some brown rice and garnish with mandarin orange wedges.
I love the extra pop of flavor when biting into the mandarin oranges.

Soy Free Orange Chicken