If there's one food that comes to mind when most Americans think of Chinese food, it's orange chicken. The ubiquitous chicken dish has been around for decades, largely in part to Panda Express.
Former Executive Chef Andy Kao is said to have created the dish for Panda back in 1987 while opening a location in Hawaii. This week, Panda Express celebrated the 30th birthday of the menu item they call their "go-to dish," and Chef Jimmy Wang, director of culinary innovation at Panda Express, assured Delish it's not leaving the menu any time soon.
"As a chef, we all strive to try and top what's the best," Wang explains. "But in the three years I've been with the company, everything I've worked on seems to not be able to beat our orange chicken."
More than 50 percent of orders include orange chicken, the restaurant says. You could probably guess the top order overall – half chow mein, half fried rice, and orange chicken.
Panda Express sells an astonishing 70 million pounds of orange chicken each year, with the West Coast leading the charge.
"Something about orange chicken just really shines with them," Wang says of West Coast customers. That's not totally by chance – the chain started in California, and Chef Kao was looking for a dish that "really spoke out for Panda in terms of being from California originally," Wang says. Since California produces $1 billion worth of citrus annually, using an orange flavor was a natural fit.
The chicken itself is made with dark meat that is lightly battered then fried. Before creating orange chicken as we know it, Panda Express restaurants in Hawaii served a similar dish with bone-in meat. Kao and Panda Express founder Andrew Cherng decided they wanted something more convenient, so they lost the bones and turned to fried chicken.
"Who doesn't like fried chicken?" Wang points out. "Fried chicken itself is already an everyday comfort... there's that acceptance with it. Overall, I think comfort level is always the number one."
But of course, the distinguishing factor for Panda's orange chicken is the sauce. Wang says it's the sauce's combination of sweet, sour, and savory flavor profiles that makes it stand out. The recipe includes brown sugar, vinegar, soy sauce, ginger, and crushed chili to give it a little bit of a kick, without making it spicy. To get the fresh orange taste, they use oils from the citrus peel.
Over the years, Panda Express chefs have played with the amount of garlic and ginger, but overall, the recipe "stays around the same parameter," Wang says, and it's most definitely here to stay.
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