Asian-ish Orange Chicken Burritos

Inspired from Publix’s Asian Chicken Quesadillas With Sweet Orange Brown Rice and of course the semi-recent success of the Dinner Divas Mandarin Orange Chicken spinoff success… the verdict: not bad but the brown rice didn’t hold it’s own so much for me I found it a little bland but the Hubs insists it was fine and the 6 yo said it was “the best sandwich [he] ever tasted”… so I don’t know maybe I didn’t add enough salt or then again maybe it’s just the cold… who knows…

Asian-ish Orange Chicken Burritos

inside, outside, but not upside down... HAHA, I crack myself up...

1 c brown rice
2.5 c water
1 T butter
2 T rice vinegar
salt, 1 tsp ginger, 2 tsp garlic
1-2 cans mandarin oranges in juice, drained (3/4 c juices reserved)
1/4 c sugar
1 T dk soy sauce (or tamari)
1 c water
1 lbs bnls/skls chicken tenders (mine were frozen)
1 bag Pacifica Veggie Supreme Salad **
1 c shredded colby jack cheese
6 10 in flour tortillas

Bring rice thru garlic to a boil and simmer until rice is cooked… Mix reserved juice, sugar, soy sauce, and water & bring to a boil… add chicken tenders and poach, flipping once… remove chicken and shred while poaching liquid reduces to a sauce… Mix salad together… add the shredded chicken to the sauce and coat…

add your shredded chicken to the sauce...

add the rice, then the oranges...

add your chicken and sauce...

add your salad, then add your cheese...

 

 

 

 

 

To assemble: put a bit of rice on each tortilla, top with oranges, top with chicken and sauce (or not, as this chicken was good on its own and the rice needed a boost, so this sauce might have been better mixed with the rice… *shrugs*), top with salad and top with cheese… roll up burrito style, and put seam side down in a pan with a little bit of hot oil to melt the cheese and seal shut the burrito… flip and fry the top side until a bit golden… (if you’re gonna also crisp up the sides, then start with the side that tucks under the outer flap… then move to the bottom… this will help insure a good tight seal…)

** A bit lame on the add in veggies especially the peas (which though disappointing, is apparently is no fluke but a rather common occurance), so next time I’ll do my own version of this… I’m thinking: lettuce (which I’ll probably shred) or just a bag of mixed greens, maybe 1/4-1/2 c ea: snow peas and grated carrots, 2-3 T ea: roasted soynuts and sesame seeds, 1/3-1/2 c Brianna’s Rich Poppy Seed Dressing… (but truth be known, I may revisit the bag again too… LOL)

Mandarin Orange Chicken Salad Wraps

Super Belated Dinner Diva… This was a would be road food on our menu 2 times, but both times replaced eating on the go with a sit down meal… Once I finally made it I still didn’t get around to posting it, but can I say I LOVED this! We made it with a cold rotisserie chicken ($3.33, I think, since they’d pulled it from the heat lamps and chilled it… so really not worth the effort to roast your own anymore at that price, so we bought 3 and froze two in gallon ziplocs for future laziness…) which made it so blooming easy… But it really wouldn’t have been much harder to cook the chicken if you were making a smaller batch, we just didn’t want to have to cook meat in two batches so this was a perfect fix as everything go done at once and really in very little time… plus leftovers for later, so win-win… minimum effort, maximum food… Very Yummy, we all really enjoyed this… (and the base was even a cooking light recipe, so maybe I should try more of their stuff… as this was actually tasty…)

the orginal recipe

Mandarin Orange Chicken Salad Wraps **
meat pulled from 1 rotisserie chicken (minus skin)
4 tsp Watkin’s garlic-ginger grapeseed oil (bought from one of Hub’s friend’s to support her efforts, easy enough to infuse your own though)
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cayenne
2 (11 oz) cans mandarin oranges in juice (reserve 1/4 c juice when draining)
1/2 c green onion
1/4 c chive
2 tsp minced garlic
1 c chicken broth
2 T tamari (or dark soy sauce)
2 T cornstarch
1 head of cabbage, shredded
8 oz bean sprouts
8 lg flour tortillas

Warm chicken, oil, s/p, 1 can oranges, 1/4 c juice/syrup from oranges, onions, chives and garlic over med heat. Combine broth, tamari, and cornstarch; add to pan. Bring to a boil; simmer until thickened. Add other can of drained oranges (after this is when I took half out). Add cabbage and sprouts and toss well to coat/dress them then just wrap up in the tortillas…

** I only assembled half of this so I pulled half the meat mixture off to the side to cool for packing away, and only used half the cabbage, sprouts and tortillas…

Bacon Cheddar Tuna Melts

Ok, so hubs was asked to buy bean sprouts (to add crunch factor to girlie’s wraps tomorrow) and came home with alfalfa sprouts the other day instead so I put them in here upon the recommendation of someone at the What’s Cooking message board… SO, it didn’t go over too well with 2 out of 3 littles in this house… but my reservations about adding them to a warm sandwich were relieved. And well, I love a grand variety of tuna melts for their simplicity and effortlessness… and I took another shortcut this time using bottled dressing instead of making one.

Bacon Cheddar Tuna Melts
2 cans of tuna, drained
Kraft Caesar Vinaigrette with Parm dressing/marinade
8 slices bread
4-8 slices slices cheddar cheese (depending on whether you like cheese on both sides or not)
8 slices of bacon (you could use less I reckon, I could have stretched 6 slices to work for us)
1/2 container of alfalfa sprouts

I cut the bacon strips in half before cooking to make them more compact within the sandwich. Cook the bacon to crisp, then drain of the grease and either reuse some of it or add back you desired fat to toast the sandwiches with… I put cheese on each slice of bread, layer tuna (mixed with as much of the dressing as is needed to reach you desired state of wetness) on one slice of cheese and bacon on the other, then toast both bread sides together or separately (depending on the number you are making at once and/or rush you are in) in the pan as one would a grilled cheese… open the sandwiches (if necessary) and add the spouts between the fish and bacon, reassemble…

PS. This would probably have been good with sliced tomatoes, if you go for things like that… For example, I would have done some for hubs had they been in the fridge… just popping them on while adding the sprouts.