,

Healthy Orange Chicken Recipe

Katie Wells Avatar

Reading Time: 3 minutes

This post contains affiliate links.

Read my affiliate policy.

Wellness Mama » Blog » Recipes » Poultry Recipes » Healthy Orange Chicken Recipe

In college, orange chicken was my weakness. I loved Chinese food and frequently ordered other menu items, but the crispy chicken tossed with vegetables and a sweet and spicy orange glaze was my favorite. I ate it many late nights while studying. Healthy? Not so much. Delicious? Absolutely.

These days I prefer to make restaurant favorites at home with healthier ingredients. I’ve overhauled many Chinese favorites, including kung pao chicken and beef and broccoli. Now, for all you other orange chicken lovers out there, here’s how I make it.

Homemade Crispy Orange Chicken

As with practically all foods, I’ve found that healthy versions made at home can actually taste better than the original. Even without the MSG and chemical flavoring agents, something about real whole foods just wins out.

To make the chicken crispy, I bread it in a mix of almond flour, arrowroot powder, and spices. Then I fry it. I like to use coconut oil or tallow for frying because of their healthy fat profile, mild flavor, and high smoke point. If you’ve never tried frying, don’t be intimidated. It’s a lot easier than it seems. Just make sure your oil is nice and hot before you start, and let it heat up again between batches.

However, if you don’t love the texture of crispy, fried chicken or just don’t want the bother of frying, you can absolutely just saute the chicken pieces until they’re cooked through. I’ve done it that way myself on busy nights, and I promise the end result is still delicious.

Making a Flavorful Orange Sauce

While the chicken is cooking, I make the zesty orange sauce to pour over it. I use the juice and zest of three whole oranges and one lemon and add some coconut aminos for salt, chili garlic sauce for a little heat, and arrowroot for thickening.

I let it all simmer for a good while to let the flavors meld and the sauce thicken. If you decide to saute the chicken rather than fry it, you can just whisk the sauce ingredients (minus the arrowroot) into the sauteed chicken and let it all simmer together for a while. Add the arrowroot at the end to thicken.

I like to serve the finished orange chicken over some cauliflower rice or fresh steamed broccoli. It’s delicious, filling, and nutritious. If you like Chinese food, try this recipe! Maybe next I’ll try making a veggie lo mein with shirataki noodles.

Healthy Orange Chicken Recipe

A delicious orange chicken recipe made with healthier ingredients, that rivals the best restaurants for taste!
Prep Time 20 minutes
Cook Time 25 minutes
Total Time 45 minutes
Calories 414kcal
Author Katie Wells

Servings

4 cups

Ingredients

Breading

Sauce

Instructions

To Cook the Chicken

  • Cut the chicken into bite-sized pieces.
  • In a large skillet, heat the coconut oil, tallow, or lard over medium-high heat.
  • In a small bowl, beat the eggs with the water and set aside.
  • In a medium-size bowl, mix together the almond flour, the ¼ cup of arrowroot powder, salt, pepper, garlic powder, and ginger.
  • Dip the chicken into the egg mixture, then into the flour mixture, shaking to remove excess flour.
  • Test the hotness of the oil by dropping a small bit of chicken in. If it immediately starts foaming and bubbling vigorously the oil is ready.
  • Carefully drop the breaded chicken pieces into the hot oil, cooking about 3-5 minutes per side until cooked through. Do not stir or move chicken except to flip once during cooking as it may knock off the breading.
  • Carefully remove the chicken from the pan and place on a plate to cool.
  • Repeat with all the chicken until cooked. 

To Make the Sauce

  • While chicken is cooking and cooling, zest and juice the oranges and lemon into a medium-sized saucepan.
  • Add the coconut aminos, chili garlic sauce, and honey.
  • Stir well and whisk in the 1 tablespoon arrowroot powder.
  • Bring to a simmer and continue simmering over medium-low heat for 15-20 minutes or until it reaches desired thickness. Do not let it boil or burn! If you want a thicker sauce, add a little more arrowroot.
  • Pour the sauce over the chicken and lightly toss to coat.

Nutrition

Nutrition Facts
Healthy Orange Chicken Recipe
Amount Per Serving (1 cup)
Calories 414 Calories from Fat 166
% Daily Value*
Fat 18.4g28%
Saturated Fat 14.4g90%
Cholesterol 83mg28%
Sodium 279mg12%
Carbohydrates 51.2g17%
Fiber 4.4g18%
Sugar 32g36%
Protein 12.8g26%
* Percent Daily Values are based on a 2000 calorie diet.

Notes

You can completely skip the flour and egg steps if you don’t want to bread the chicken and can just stir fry the bite-sized pieces of chicken in 2 tablespoons coconut oil until cooked
Alternately, you can bread the chicken and place it on a well-oiled baking sheet and bake at 375°F for least 30 minutes or until cooked through in the oven.

Like this recipe? Check out my new cookbook, or get all my recipes (over 500!) in a personalized weekly meal planner here!

Ever made healthy versions of your favorite foods? How did they turn out?

Katie Wells Avatar

About Katie Wells

Katie Wells, CTNC, MCHC, Founder of Wellness Mama and Co-founder of Wellnesse, has a background in research, journalism, and nutrition. As a mom of six, she turned to research and took health into her own hands to find answers to her health problems. WellnessMama.com is the culmination of her thousands of hours of research and all posts are medically reviewed and verified by the Wellness Mama research team. Katie is also the author of the bestselling books The Wellness Mama Cookbook and The Wellness Mama 5-Step Lifestyle Detox.

Comments

19 responses to “Healthy Orange Chicken Recipe”

  1. tinners Avatar

    Looks delicious! Quick question. Step 2 states “In a medium size bowl, mix the almond flour, ¼ of the arrowroot, salt, pepper, garlic powder, and ginger.”

    By 1/4 of, does that mean 1/4 of (1/4 c + 1T)? Or something else?
    Thanks so much!

  2. Jessica Avatar

    Made this for dinner tonight. Very good but if your oranges are on the larger side be careful with how much of the zest you use. Mine were slightly larger than a baseball and it was a bit much in my opinion. I also added minced garlic instead of the chili garlic sauce since I didn’t have any.

  3. Sarah H Avatar

    5 stars
    This is delicious!!!!!! We poured it over steamed purple kale and broccoli. Delicious. Delicious. Whole family satisfied in their fried chicken craving, but healthy. Thank you.

  4. Melissa Avatar

    Hi!
    Wondering how I find out the calorie content per serving, trying really hard to watch my intake on food!
    xo

  5. Amanda Avatar

    5 stars
    This was amazing!!! My husband who doesn’t usually love the healthier version of popular dishes loved it!!

  6. Charmaine Taylor Avatar
    Charmaine Taylor

    Just made this for lunch. Only had one orange in hand, so I used 5 lemons. Wow! Tart and delicious! Sautéed snow peas from the garden and tossed it together. Will make this version again!!

  7. Leigh Avatar

    Could I use coconut flour instead? I’m allergic to almonds. Thanks for the recipe@endlesswellness:disqus

      1. Leigh Avatar

        Thanks. Yeah almond flour sounds great here! I’m bummed since my pregnancy I have developed an allergy to almonds and various other things. I always appreciate your recipes. 🙂

  8. Shelly Avatar

    Love love love this recipe. I skipped the breading and my whole family loved it. I had left over sauce so we used it as a dip for bacon wrapped shrimp the next night!! AMAZING!!!

  9. Sherry Avatar

    This was amazing! I think I got too much pith in it or too much rind as I had to add more honey.

  10. The Good Calorie Avatar
    The Good Calorie

    Hi there, I have some Registered Dietitian colleagues thinking that the “Healthy” here in the title may be trumped by the 1 cup of saturated fat (coconut oil – about 1900 calories and 220gm fat-, tallow, or lard) that the recipe calls for. While the recipe looks DELICIOUS, what do you think could substituted here to make it healthy?  Thanks for any feedback

    1. Wellness Mama Avatar
      Wellness Mama

      I think we’ll have to agree to disagree on this one. I’m of the mindset that saturated fats from good sources (coconut oil, grassfed meats, etc) is healthy and good and fats like Canola oil and vegetable oil should be avoided at all cost. If you consider those franken oils healthy, by all means, you could sub vegetable oil.

  11. Ken Avatar

    Made this tonight. Followed recipe exactly but used my fry daddy to fry chicken. Wow, this was a knockout! Served it over spaghetti squash and a side of steamed broccoli. Plan to make this sauce in bulk and freeze it so it’s ready at a moment’s notice!

  12. Marie Avatar

    I made this the other night, it was great, but it was super sweet. What can i do to tone down the sweetness?  I did use the honey which i’m sure made it sweet, but it helped to thicken it up as well.

    1. Wellness Mama Avatar
      Wellness Mama

      You could omit some of the orange or just use more arrowroot to thicken instead of the honey.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Recipe Rating