Chinese Take-Out at Home: Sweet and Sour Chicken

Monday, March 30, 2009

Chinese Take-Out at Home: Sweet and Sour Chicken

As promised, I'm back with our go-to Sweet and Sour Chicken recipe. Go-to because it's one of the easiest things I've ever made and the ingredients are pretty much pre-packaged. I love that kind of meal.

Here's what you'll need:

1 pound of Chicken breasts, Garlic Powder, Canned Pineapple with juice reserved, 1/4 cup Soy Sauce, 1 Tablespoon Brown Sugar, Frozen Stir Fry Veggies, Sweet and Sour Sauce.
Makes 4 servings.

Cut up the chicken into bite sized pieces and toss them in your skillet with a little bit of olive oil. Cook those little chicken bits - 3 to 5 minutes.

Toss some garlic powder on those chicken bits. I like to shake a lot of garlic powder on my chicken, you might like just a little bit. Go crazy. Or don't.

Open up your canned pineapple and pour the juice into a small bowl. Toss the Pineapple chunks into your chicken bits. You wanna make sure you have at least 1/4 cup of juice in the bowl, but I like to use the whole can.

Now, mix that reserved pineapple juice with the soy sauce and brown sugar. You could also pour 1/4 cup of Sweet and Sour Sauce in at this point, but I don't. I keep the sweet and sour to the end. No reason, I just like it that way. But march to your own beat, reader. Use the sweet and sour whenever you want. Pour the sauce mixture onto the chicken and pineapple and let the ingredients get acquainted for about a couple of minutes.

Once you think the ingredients know each other well enough, you can introduce them to the veggies. You don't want to do this too soon because veggies have more color and make chicken and pineapple jealous. Or maybe food doesn't have feelings, I don't know. I've been snowbound, please forgive me.

Anyway, just toss those frozen veggies right into the skillet and stir 'em around. Just let that simmer until your little heart's content or you get hungry. I've found that 10 minutes of simmering is just about right.

When you're ready to serve (with rice, of course!) pour a little sweet and sour sauce on top of your chicken and veggies (if you didn't add it to the sauce) and devour because it's healthy, wholesome and so delicious.