Orange chicken is a Chinese take-away favourite. It’s batter coated, deep fried pieces of chicken, with a fairly thin coating of sweet and spicy orange-soy sauce. I decided to create a stir-fried version of this dish, to avoid the deep frying. I know, I’m not always proud of my healthy food choices, but who needs deep frying when a dish tastes this good with one third of the oil. I also made it a bit more saucy so that you can feel the sweet, tangy, spicy, orangey sauce in every bite, and not just a hint of it. This dish can be done in half an hour. Serve it with rice but plain is also fantastic. This beats Chinese take-away any day.

Ingredients for the chicken

• 700 grams chicken thighs, no skin or bone, sliced in small pieces
• 1 tsp soy sauce
• 1 tsp dry sherry
• 1 egg white
• 1/2 Tbs cornflour
• 3 Tbs sunflower oil

Ingredients for the sauce

• 1 cup orange juice (I used the juice of two medium-large oranges)
• 1 Tbs orange zest
• 3 Tbs soy sauce
• 2 Tbs Rice vinegar
• 2 Tbs dry sherry
• 2 Tbs honey
• 2 Tbs sweet chilli sauce
• 2 tsp sesame oil
• 1/4 tsp chilli flakes
• 1 clove garlic, crushed
• 1 tsp fresh ginger, finely chopped or grated
• 3 tsp cornflour

spring onion and red chilli to garnish

Method

Put chicken pieces in a bowl. Pour over the soy sauce, sherry and mix. In a small bowl beat the egg white with a fork to break it up a bit. Stir in the cornflour and pour over the chicken. Mix and leave chicken to marinate while you prepare the rest.

Prepare the sauce by combining all the ingredients together in a bowl. Keep some orange zest for garnish if you like.

In a large non stick frying pan or wok, heat the sunflower oil over high heat. Add half of the chicken and stir fry until nicely coloured but not necessarily cooked through. Don’t worry if it looks like a mess! Transfer chicken from the wok to a glass bowl. Add the second batch of chicken to the wok and stir-fry until nicely coloured. Return all the chicken back to the wok and add the sauce. Cook chicken and sauce together, over high heat, stirring occasionally until sauce is reduced and thickened. It should coat the chicken nicely.

Serve at once, garnished with chopped spring onion, red chilli and orange zest.

Note: Sauce will become thicker as chicken cools, so if you are cooking in advance you will need to thin it with some water. Same applies for reheating any left-overs.