Chicken breast a l’orange

We see so many chicken breast halves it’s easy to overlook whole bone-in chicken breast, an economical alternative to roasting a whole bird and the perfect choice when cooking for two. This is a super — and healthy — way to prepare one, giving us a moist, flavorful and attractive breast.

The recipe is from the Chicken for Dieters section of The Perdue Chicken Cookbook and it’s low-sodium as well as lean. I think it’s fine as is, the bright sauce eliminating the need for additional salt, and I hope you’ll taste the chicken and sauce together before deciding whether it needs more. Even salt lovers might be surprised.

When we think of poultry prepared this way, most think of duck à l’orange, a retro dish if ever there was one. A few years ago, Gourmet magazine discovered it pre-dates the June Cleaver era and reprinted a duck à l’orange recipe it ran in 1943. It’s fun reading and interesting to see how this streamlined sauce for chicken breast is faithful to the spirit of its ancestor while adapting to today’s lighter needs.

Chicken Breast à l’Orange

Adapted from Mitzi Perdue

1 whole bone-in chicken breast
1 1/2 TB brown sugar (granulated brown is fine)
1 1/2 TB corn starch
1/4 to 1/2 tsp fresh-ground black pepper
2/3 cup /150 ml fresh-squeezed orange juice
2/3 cup /150 ml low-sodium chicken broth
1 TB fresh-squeezed lemon juice
4 – 5 strips orange zest, julienned

Leave the skin on the breast while roasting and remove before eating.

Set a rack in the middle of the oven and preheat to 350F/180C/Gas 4.

Pat the breast dry with a paper towel. Roast, skin side up, for 45 minutes.

While it cooks, make the sauce. Combine the brown sugar, corn starch and black pepper in a medium sauce pan and mix well to combine. Over medium heat, slowly add the orange juice and chicken broth, stirring constantly to dissolve the brown sugar and corn starch. Bring to a boil and cook, stirring constantly, for another 1 to 2 minutes, until the sauce is thickened. Remove from the heat, stir in the lemon juice and orange zest and set aside.

When the breast has cooked for 45 minutes, remove about half the sauce (the measuring cup you used for the juice and broth is fine) and set aside. Baste the breast liberally from the other half of the sauce and return to the oven. Let it cook until no pink remains inside, another 10 to 20 minutes depending on size, basting twice more during this time. [My breast was about 1.5 pounds and spent 59 minutes in the oven. It might sound like a long time, but there's a lot of door-opening at the end that brings down the temperature. ~ ella]

Nuke or reheat reserved sauce, if necessary, and serve with the breast.

Ella’s Notes: There’s enough sauce here to make two whole breasts and the dish is certainly suitable for entertaining if serving more than two people. I see no reason why this can’t be scaled up for a whole turkey breast to serve even more or cut in half for a cornish hen or two.

Your Gadget Queen used a tool called Wavy Knife to julienne the orange zest. It was $2 at TJ Maxx.

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Tagged as: budget meals, chicken, easy, entertaining, healthy recipes