Pressure-Cooked Mandarin Chicken

I've made a few things in the pressure cooker now, but this is the first to be good enough to get pictures and a blog entry.  I'm refining my beef stew recipe and will hopefully get that one up in the next week or two.  In the mean time, I found this recipe while looking for pressure cooker recipes.  It sounded simple and I figured even the 4 year old would like it, so I gave it a whirl.  I've doubled the chicken from the amount in the original recipe, because it made WAY more sauce than chicken, and made a couple of other very minor tweaks.  I might tweak it a little bit more the next time, but this is going in the keeper files.  Very little prep time, very little active cooking time, and it makes for a great dinner that we can all enjoy together.  Enjoy!

Mandarin Chicken

Ingredients:

• 1½ lb boneless, skinless chicken breasts, chopped into bite-sized pieces
• 1 Tablespoon balsamic vinegar
• 2 cups chicken stock or broth
• 1 onion, cut into thin wedges
• 1 teaspoon dried tarragon
• 1 can (11 oz) mandarin oranges   
• 1 Tablespoon honey
• 2 Tablespoons low-sodium soy sauce
• ¼ cup cornstarch
• ¼ cup water
• Freshly ground pepper, to taste
• Rice, for serving

Directions:

1. In the pressure cooker, combine chicken, vinegar, stock and onions.  Lock the lid in place and bring to pressure (15 psi), then lower heat to just maintain pressure and cook for 5 minutes.  Allow pressure to drop by the natural release method for 10 minutes, and then release remaining pressure and remove the lid.
2. Transfer chicken to a platter and keep warm.  Leave the stock mixture in the pressure cooker, and stir in tarragon, oranges (with juice), honey and soy sauce. 
3. Combine the cornstarch and water, stir into the stock mixture, and cook uncovered over medium heat until the sauce thickens.
4. Serve the chicken over rice.  Add freshly ground pepper to taste.

Notes:
I didn't have tarragon, so I used a pinch of crushed fennel seeds. 

Comments

[Mstrong73]

I love my pressure cooker. If nothing else it makes the fastest richest chicken stock on the planet