Crispy Vegan Orange Chicken (Copycat Panda Express)

If you would like to make Orange Chicken, the most popular dish in Panda Express vegan at home, this is the recipe you need to try. We used the BEST plant-based alternative to crunchy fried chicken strips and covered them with a citrusy, sticky, spicy orange sauce. We made it allergy-friendly so everyone can enjoy this dish. This means there is NO TOFU and NO GLUTEN!

We have other copycat recipes you may be interested in like this orange cauliflower, orange tofu, copycat IKEA veggie balls or this copycat Chipotle veggie bowl or this copycat Chipotle veggie burrito with fajita veggies. More to come I promise. Email us which copycat recipe you would like to see next.

How does Panda Express make Orange Chicken?

Orange Chicken is a signature dish in Panda Express. It is one of the most popular dishes on their menu. According to Mashed, they sell more than 100 million pounds of this entree PER YEAR. That is a lot.

Mashed’s article makes a pretty amazing job at trying to analyze what are the ingredients that made up this dish. Here is what they come up with:

• dark meat chicken (thighs not breast) deep-fried in a crunchy coating
• the orange sauce is umami which means sour, sweet, bitter, salty, and spicy at the same time
• the key ingredients of the sauce: ginger, brown sugar, garlic, crushed chile peppers, soy sauce, orange peel oil

However, due to strong demand at the end of 2021, Panda Express launched in cooperation with Beyond Meat a new vegan dish which they call Beyond The Original Orange Chicken. They say it mimics the original Orange Chicken recipe as close as possible.

Sadly it is still not gluten-free and they also don’t call it “vegan” but “plant-based” since they prepare this dish in the same kitchen where cross-contamination can happen with other non-vegan dishes. If it is not suitable for you, don’t worry, this recipe is just perfect and the closest possible to enjoy a delicious vegan orange chicken at home.

Ingredients

They say that the sauce is the heart of this dish. Partly that is true as we made great emphasis on getting it right. But we also paid an equal amount of attention to using the best vegan substitute for dark meat chicken and to make the best crunchy coating. We are a vegan and gluten-free blog, so this coating is undetectably gluten-free. Look how gorgeous they look in the below picture!

Orange sauce

• orange juice
• orange zest
• cane sugar
• molasses
• freshly minced garlic
• freshly minced ginger
• sriracha sauce
• soy sauce (or tamari)
• rice wine vinegar
• vegetable oil
• corn starch

Crunchy coating

• chickpea flour
• white rice flour
• cornstarch
• garlic powder
• salt
• black pepper
• dairy-free milk (we recommend oat milk, almond milk, or cashew milk)

The best vegan chicken substitute

Oyster mushrooms! If you have been on our blog, you saw that we have been raving about this ingredient all the time. They are the best vegan meat alternative to shredded meat and meat strips (may they be originally chicken, pork, or beef). Other types of oyster mushrooms as well as some of these substitutes can work too to make this recipe. Here is a list of where to buy them.

Why are oyster mushrooms better than cauliflower florets or tofu or even seitan?

• They are super easy to prepare, only 3 steps.
• They have a fantastic meaty, chewy texture which is way better than even extra firm tofu for this recipe.
• They are allergy-friendly so there is no soy or gluten.
• While you can definitely taste the cauliflower, there is no mushroom taste at all!

How to make the best vegan orange chicken?

Prepare the crunchy coating

1. Wet batter – Take a shallow bowl and mix dairy-free milk, chickpea flour, white rice flour, garlic powder, salt, and black pepper with a whisk. It should have a texture of a thick pancake batter, slow-flowing but not too dense. In time the flour may thicken the batter a bit, so add 1 tsp of water to thin it again.
2. Dry mix – Take another shallow bowl and mix white rice flour, corn starch, salt, and black pepper with a spoon.

Bread oyster mushroom strips

1. Tear oyster mushrooms into shreds with your hands. No need to wash or peel them. They grow on trees, not in dirt, so they shouldn’t be dirty at all.
2. Have both wet batter and dry mix in two separate shallow bowls.
3. Dip the oyster mushroom first in the wet batter. Coat it evenly. I found it is easier to use your fingers to do that instead of using a fork or spatula.
4. Transfer gently the coated mushroom to the dry mix. Sprinkle the top and pat it gently.
5. When it is coated you can place it on a plate or fry it immediately. The coating will hold at room temperature for an hour or so without a problem if you need to wait before frying.

Frying or deep-frying?

You don’t need to deep-fry them in a ton of oil. You can use a non-stick frying pan and coat it with ½-inch oil. Heat it over medium/high heat.

You can test whether it is hot enough by dropping a bit of coating in it. If it sizzles, you are good to go. Why do you need the oil to be hot? If it is not hot enough it will take a long them to get them crispy and in the meantime, the mushroom and the coating will soak up a lot of oil.

When the oil is sizzling, add the coated strips. Flipping them occasionally. It shouldn’t take more than 2 minutes to fry them. They will be nice, crunchy, and golden brown just like in the below picture.

Prepare the orange sauce

1. Peel and mince ginger and garlic. Wash and grate some orange zest.
2. Take a small bowl and mix cornstarch, orange juice (100%), orange zest, cane sugar, soy sauce (or tamari for gluten-free), sriracha (or other chili paste), and white rice vinegar. It will be your slurry to add later.
3. Take a saucepan and heat it over medium heat. Add oil, minced garlic, and ginger and saute them for 1-2 minutes.
4. Add the slurry from the small bowl and mix well. Simmer it for a couple of minutes until the cornstarch is activated and the sauce starts to thicken.
5. Add molasses and stir well. Your orange sauce is ready now!

Top tips to make it perfectly

You have your fried crispy vegan chicken strips and you have the sticky orange sauce. The amount of sauce in the recipe is enough to coat 4 servings of oyster mushrooms (7-8 oz).

How best to serve it? Here are a couple of tips to make sure you have perfect vegan orange chicken.

• Coat to strips while the sauce is hot. The battered oyster mushroom can cool on a rack or on a paper towel, but a warm/hot sauce sticks to them more evenly than a cold one.
• If you let the sauce cool, you can re-heat it over medium heat. Never on high as you can mess with the corn starch and the sauce might lose its thickness.
• We recommend doing the coating per serving. We take ¼ of the orange sauce and add it to a warm skillet or pan. Add 1 serving of fried vegan chicken and mix well.
• Serve it immediately over steamed or cooked rice.

What to serve with it?

It is essentially a stir fry dish that you can serve with white or brown steamed or cooked rice. You can get creative and try it with fried rice, fried noodles, quinoa, cauliflower rice, or even sweet potato rice. Even mixed vegetables like broccoli or asparagus go great with this recipe. We sprinkled them with chopped green onions and sesame seeds. And garnished it with some extra orange zest.

FAQs and substitutions

Can you use an air fryer?

I don’t have an air fryer to test it properly, but the air fryer’s main purpose is the deep fry food without oil. Place the breaded oyster mushrooms on the basket of the air fryer in one layer. Turn the air fryer on and set the temperature high. Fry only for a couple of minutes and check them.

Can you bake them in the oven?

We tested this recipe in the oven as well. We spread them around on a baking sheet with parchment paper and baked them for approx. 20 minutes on 395 Fahrenheit. Sadly, the coating was not as crispy as when you fry them in oil. But in my opinion that is the case with every food. The difference between baking and frying is huge.

Can you use other flours?

We only tested this recipe with these ingredients as we wanted the crispiest gluten-free coating possible. If you want to substitute chickpea flour you can use maybe yellow corn flour or instead of cornstarch you can use tapioca starch. If you need other tapioca starch substitutes, check out this list. In any case, let us know in the comments.

How to store it?

Let’s be honest it is really hard to store breaded and fried food (any type) in a way that keeps the crunchiness for long. This dish is also best served while it is hot. With that being said I stored the strips in an air-tight container without any sides in the refrigerator and the coating more or less remained intact and crunchy for the next 24 hours. On the 2nd day though, it was rather dry and soggy.

Can you make them ahead of time?

You can store oyster mushrooms easily for up to a week in the fridge, or at room temperature for 1-2 days. For more tips, read our how to store oyster mushrooms article. The finished dish can be stored in the fridge for up to 1-2 days tops.

More vegan copycat recipes

You will find 19 copycat Chipotle vegan recipes here or try one of these below:

More vegan oyster mushroom recipes

Don’t know what else to cook with oyster mushrooms? You will find 30+ vegan oyster mushroom recipes to give you even more ideas to enjoy this awesome ingredient. Here are some of our favorites as well:

• Vegan Buffalo Chicken Dip
• Vegan Gyros
• Vegan Philly Cheesesteak
• Vegan Cajun Chicken Pasta
• Crispy Oyster Mushroom Tacos