This 20 minute Cashew Chicken recipe is great for weeknights but holy crap. WHY must easy meals always be for weeknights. Make it this weekend so you have more time for important weekend things. Like napping.
Every once in a while I'll rediscover a recipe that I used to make all the time. For whatever reason I'll forget about it - oftentimes for years - until I remember it and think Why don't I ever make that anymore? And then I make it. Such was the case with this Cashew Chicken recipe. I hadn't made it in years then a few weeks ago I decided to make it. I had to come back to this recipe on my own blog to remember the ingredients. As I read through my own blog post of my own recipe I found myself doubting myself.
Thinking - 20 minutes??? There's no way this can be done in 20 minutes. You're a dirty liar Karen. So I got my ingredients out, set up a timer, flipped on my video camera and got to work. The results of that little experiment a bit later on.
I learned to cook chicken from my mother. Ergo ... I cook my chicken until the pink is gone and it's nice and moist and tender. And then I cook for about an hour more.
My name is Karen, and I'm a chicken overcooker. Always. You hand me a chicken breast, and I'll hand you back chicken jerky. And then I'll ask you to give it back to me so I can cook it some more.
But it'll be cooked and no one will die and we'll all continue to live the exciting lives we lead, unless you happen to choke on my chicken. Which is entirely possible, since it isn't chewable you pretty much have to swallow the whole breast in one go, like a trained seal eats a fish you throw at it.
Because I am chicken challenged, I've taken to usually cooking chicken either in thin slices, or small cubes. For some reason I don't feel the need to overcook my chicken when I do this. Although it's not a guarantee.
I really do have military precision when it comes to overcooking my chicken. I know the *exact* point I need to go over to make it inedible. It's a gift.
This cashew chicken recipe includes the much heralded chicken cubes. Enjoy.
20 Minute Skillet Cashew Chicken
You're gonna get some green onions and cut them where the white meets the green.
Then chop those up.
Open that can of mandarin oranges and toast those cashews. Grab your chicken dice it up, plunk it into a plastic bag with corn starch and shake it.
Finally you're going to heat the oil, throw the chicken, white part of the green onions and garlic and cook until the chicken is done to your liking. Not MY liking. Yours.
The cubes take about 3 minute to cook through but I like to cook them for 7-8 hours. Take your pick.
If you double the recipe you'll have to cook the chicken in batches because if you add too much chicken to the pan it'll steam. Bad. NO steaming. You want the chicken to pan fry and get crispy.
Once everything is cooked you're gonna add a massive splash of rice vinegar, some Hoisin sauce and water. Cook it up, remove it from the heat, throw on the green onions, toasted cashes and drained mandarin oranges.
Your dinner is done.
10. Serve on a bed of rice.
This is soooooo good you could fool anyone into thinking it took all day. If you *did* want it to take all day you could marinate your chicken in an asian inspired marinade prior to cooking it. Just a thought.
Cashew Chicken
Ingredients
- 2 chicken breasts
- 1 Tbsp. corn starch apx.
- 3 garlic cloves minced
- 8 green onions
- ¼ cup Hoisin Sauce
- ¼ cup Rice Vinegar unseasoned
- ¼ cup water
- ¾ cup cashews toasted over medium/low heat in pan
- 1 can mandarin oranges 284 ml.
- Salt & Pepper
- 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
Instructions
- Toast cashews in pan over medium/low heat.
- Clean and separate green onions into white and green parts.
- Chop both white and green parts into 1" sections. If the white part of the green onions is very large around, also slice in half lengthwise.
- Dice your chicken breasts into even, bite sized pieces.
- Add cornstarch and salt & pepper to plastic bag.
- Plunk your chicken into the bag.
- Blow a little air into the bag, twist it closed and shake the chicken in the cornstarch.
- Fry your coated chicken, the WHITE part of the green onions and garlic over medium/high heat in 1 Tbsp. vegetable oil. You may have to do 2 batches to avoid overcrowding (and therefore steaming) the chicken. Add another Tbsp. of oil if a second batch is needed and remove the first batch to a plate.
- Once the chicken, onions and garlic are cooked, return it all to the pan. Add ¼ cup of rice vinegar and cook until evaporated. Add ¼ cup Hoisin Sauce and ¼ cup of water. Cook and stir until fully combined.
- Remove from heat and stir in the green bits of the green onion, toasted cashews and oranges.
- Serve on a bed of rice.
Nutrition
If you're making this, you can make as much sauce as you want. Just use equal portions of vinegar, Hoisin Sauce and water. If you want it a bit sweeter, add more Hoisin Sauce. If you want it a bit spicier, throw in a few red pepper flakes.
Go nuts! Make it your own! You're cookin'! YOU are providing food and therefore life to you and all of those around you! They would shrivel up in the corner sucking on carpet fibres for sustenance if it weren't for you.
YOU ARE STUCK IN THE KITCHEN COOKING, BUT YOU ARE IMPORTANT DAMMIT!
Wondering if I'm a dirty liar or a truth teller? Watch my Cashew Chicken Instagram story highlight where I made this recipe live.
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As you were.
Karena
Yum one of my favorite dishes; caveat, eat it all because the cashews get soggy if you reheat!
Come over to visit, I have a New Giveaway I think you will love!
Xoxo
Karena
Art by Karena
Linda
Sounds yummy! And my answer to the oft repeated question "What's for dinner?"...is always "turkey butts & brussel sprouts"! and then I get the eye roll...
Cynna
Sounds yummy!
BTW, the email from this morning also mentioned tea towel winners, but clicking on the tab only brought up an error page. Is your cat playing on your computer again?
Karen
Cynna - LOL. I had a scheduled error. I was *going* to post the tea towel winners today, but switched it out for Cashew chicken. Tea Towel Winners tomorrow. :) ~ karen
Kendra
Hey Karen!
I too am a chicken overcooker.....therefore I'm learning to use the slow cooker! Anything that has sat and simmered for 8+ hours must be safe to eat.....
Debbie from Illinois
Karen,
Last night as I coughed up a fur-ball and suffered with a 101 fever, my lovely husband asked me what was for dinner? I am such a lady that I won't tell you what I said, but now I am craving cashew chicken.:)
Darla
Karen, that looks absolutely delicious!
You may want to re-think using random plastic bags for your food prep. Many are recycled and not necessarily food safe. Just sayin.
Love you and your blog!
Karen
Hi Darla - Well, it's a grocery bag. If that isn't food safe ... we're all in a lot of trouble. ~ karen
pat
I am so making this tonight. One of those lucky occasions where I know I have every ingredient, including a can of mandarins, which I found the other day and wondered when I'd ever use. Yum! Can't wait.
Kerri
My husband is a chicken overcooker!! Drives me nutty. Actually, he overcooks pretty much everything in fear of death. Looks yum, thankya..
Deborah
awesome recipe! hubs adores cashews, and I actually think the fusspot would eat this! :) Will try it tomorrow after I get some cashews (and hide them or he will eat them all thinking I bought them for him to nosh on) ;P
Judy
Thank you for always making me laugh, Karen. Not at you, of course, but because you share that secret side of you with us that we never want anyone to know. Makes us feel better. ("Hooray, I'm not alone!") I really look forward to being late to work so I can read your post. In my book...you're #1.
Karen
Thank you Judy! No sense hiding anything. I'm not perfect, you're not perfect, nobody's perfect. Of course, I did build a chicken coop, so that probably makes me closer to perfect than you ... but it's entirely possible you're better at ping pong than I am. It all evens out. ~ karen
Laura
& that pizza oven. You are perfect!
Dru
I don't care what the votes said, you are number 1 in my book..that #1 site was quite boring, imho..you provide information I actually put into action! thanks!
Keith
So, so true about people overcooking skinless, boneless chicken breast. My mother used to do the same thing - cook it for hours. I guess they have to make sure it's totally dead!
I always use a digital thermometer and once it reads 165 º F, that little plump and juicy thing is done (and safe). Cutting it up, as in your recipe, does help in relieving the overcooking syndrome by giving each piece more surface area.
I enjoy your recipes for their straightforward simplicity and not requiring a full shopping cart of ingredients. Do a I see a recipe book in your future? Kudos!
Deborah Flanagan
you are hilarious!! The photos are fantastic and the recipe sounds very delicious.
Karen
Thanks Deborah! ~ karen
Gayla T
How do the girls feel about this recipe? Just wondering! I always order Cashew Chicken and it has mushroom w/ other vegies like carrot and water chesnuts. The only thing oriental the girls will eat is sweet and sour pork so I'll make this and I'll trot over to my daughter's and share it with her. It sounds so good. I found some little tiny mushrooms about the size of a dime that would be good in this but I ate them already. Thanks for turning me on to another great oriental recipe that I think I can actually make.
Sue
Just pinned this to one of my pinterest boards. And, there below my board was the "other things pinned from you" link. I clicked on it only to find seven cashew chicken pins in a row.....
Karen
LOL! Excellent! ~ karen
Ginny
My fella is going to love this! Thank you!
Christina B
Sent the boyfriend to the store on his way home for hoisin sauce and cashews. Made this tonight. Amazing.
He complained that I never like the asian-ish food he makes. I told him this is KAREN'S recipe. He shut up, helped me cook, and agreed it was delicious. Thanks for another awesome dish!
Karen
I cannot believe you made this already! I posted it at midnight my time, LOL. Where in the world are you? ~ karen
Christina B
We're in LA. We both work til late, so dinner was around 10:30 or so.
Spokangela
Thank you for re-using a plastic grocery bag :) I respect you even more. And I spend (counting on fingers...) holy crap! 12 hours a week in the damn kitchen cooking dinner for my family of 6. Thank you for the much needed validation :)
Actually, I love to do it and my family hardly ever eats anything out of a box or a drive-thru so it's worth it to me. My husband made a chalkboard menu out of scrap metal and wood from an old waterbed. It turned out beautiful and the kids never have to ask me what's for dinner! So thank YOU for the menu in the kitchen idea, Karen!
Denise
LOL Angela. My response to that question was always "Fried Monkey Brains". After a while they would just give me "the look" and walk away. Problem solved. (Can you tell I HATE that question?)
mothership
OMG! we had fried bat brains just last night!
Denise
LOL! I love the comments on this blog and the PEOPLE who make them!
mothership
I know... huh! I mean how many PEOPLE could I meet in my very town/county/state (ok... maybe state!) that tells their kids they're getting fried anything brains for dinner...on a regular basis! (my oldest...27.. remembers fried cow's brains... that was before the mad cow scare!)
YES love the people that we meet through KAREN!
PS... tonite I made taco filling out of left over "little chubbies"... can you guess what that was??
Denise
Yes ... I have no idea HOW I came to use that term either. I give ... what are 'little chubbies'? The only thing that comes to mind is cheese curd (which I love but hardly ever have)since it means a trip to Amish country ...
kddomingue
Would the "little chubbies" you refer to (in a comment further down) be those little sausages? I think they're called "Little Smokies" in the package? Ah, cocktail sausages! That's what they are! (brain rebooted)
Spokangela
Indiana Jones!!! oh wait, I think that's chilled monkey brains... :)
Denise
Oh great! A nice alternative to fried ... and so much kinder to our bodies!?
Julie
BWAHAHAHAHA! Mine is WAY worse though. I always yell "Poop Balls" in a really excited voice. My kids hate it.
ecoteri
I love the comments on the comments here. Monkey brains don't sound very good, though. (bleh). I do want to know what little chubbies are. and I have a few more chicken breasts in the freezer that need to be eaten - since I have 30 chickens in a shed that will soon be in said freezer, best to move on with the older stuff. sigh. I just found some cashews in the nut fridge (yes, I do have such a thing). maybe this recipe is on the horizon?
Ev Wilcox
Holy Cow-me too! And then the look, and the walking away!
Kristin
I always answer, "dirt & worms." Shuts them right up, the little ingrates.
Noreen McKechnie
In my house it was fried farts and burnt onions
Noreen McKechnie
At our house I always answered fried farts and burnt onions like my mother before me.
Aimee
Ummm...yum.
Now I'm hungry. And entirely without Hoisin sauce. Dangit.
Thanks, though! I'm printing it to try.
Kat
you can get recipes online to make your own Hoisin sauce!
Shannon V.
THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!!!!!
Cashew chicken is one of my favourite dishes from our local Thai restaurant, mind you theirs has different veggies, but I think you could add what ever veggies you want!
Can't wait to make this one for my kids!
Karen
Shannon V. - Double up on the sauce! Kids like it saucy. :) ~ karen
Shannon V.
Thanks Karen, my kids are teenagers....an suggestions on giving it a little heat. We usually order it at a 2-3 on the heat scale (0 being no added heat and 5 being melt your socks off heat)
Lois
Add red pepper flakes to taste. (There's a note about this under the recipe that I nearly skipped because ... well, because.)