Orange Chicken
Shatteringly crisp chicken in a bright, citrus-forward glaze made from real oranges. Everything the mall-food-court version wishes it were.
Orange chicken is a Chinese-American invention, and there is no point pretending otherwise. It was popularized by Panda Express in the 1980s and has no direct ancestor in China. That does not make it bad — it makes it a dish worth doing properly rather than apologetically.
The problem with nearly every version, restaurant and homemade, is that the orange flavor comes from a bottle. Real orange juice reduced with sugar and vinegar tastes like fruit; orange-flavored syrup tastes like candy. Two actual oranges, juiced and zested, is the entire difference.
The other half of the dish is texture, and the technique for that is the double fry. Frying once at moderate heat cooks the meat but leaves moisture trapped under the coating, which steams and softens it within minutes. A second, hotter, shorter fry drives that moisture out and hardens the crust so it survives contact with the sauce.
Do the frying ahead if you like — fried chicken holds on a rack in a low oven for half an hour without suffering. What cannot be done ahead is the tossing. Sauce and chicken should meet roughly thirty seconds before someone eats them.
Instructions
- 1
Toss the chicken with salt, Shaoxing wine, and the beaten egg. Let it sit 15 minutes.
- 2
Whisk the sauce: orange juice, sugar, rice vinegar, soy sauce, and half the zest. Set it by the stove.
- 3
Dredge the marinated chicken piece by piece in cornstarch, pressing so it takes a thick, shaggy coat. Shake off the excess and rest the pieces on a rack for 5 minutes — the coating hydrates and sticks better.
- 4
Heat the oil to 350°F. Fry the chicken in three batches for 3 to 4 minutes per batch until pale gold. Drain on a rack, not on paper.
- 5
Raise the oil to 375°F and fry everything a second time for 60 to 90 seconds, until deep gold and hard-crisp. Drain again.
- 6
Pour off all but a tablespoon of oil. Fry the garlic, ginger, and chilies for 20 seconds, then pour in the sauce and bring to a boil.
- 7
Stir in the cornstarch slurry and cook about a minute, until the sauce is glossy and thick enough to coat a spoon.
- 8
Kill the heat, add the chicken, and toss fast — 20 seconds, no more. Finish with the remaining orange zest and serve immediately.
Cook’s Notes
- Fry twice. The first fry cooks the chicken, the second drives off surface moisture and sets the crust. Skip it and the coating goes soft the moment sauce touches it.
- Zest at the end, off the heat. The aromatic oils in orange zest are volatile — boil them and the dish tastes like sugar rather than citrus.
- Sauce the chicken at the very last second, ideally at the table. Every minute it sits in the glaze costs you crunch.
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