Spiralizer Saturday: Orange Chicken with Spiralized Sweet Potato

I got a spiralizer for my birthday last year and have used it a few times but like any kitchen gadget, it gets forgotten about or overlooked in the haste to put dinner on when it's already gone 7 and I've only just got in from work.

I think it's a great gadget though and has encouraged me to eat vegetables I've never even tried before. Every time I've tried to lose weight I've utterly failed (I don't eat all the things I put on this blog myself, before you say that's the reason!) but I'm getting married in June so am going to make a last ditch effort. If I end up being the size that I've been for years on my wedding day it's hardly the end of the world, but I would like to be a bit (OK, a lot) smaller!

So I've decided to launch a new blog challenge throughout January (and perhaps beyond - I'll see how it goes) called Spiralizer Saturday. Every Saturday I will host a linkup where you can share your Spiralizer recipes - or if you don't have a spiralizer, you can buy ready-spiralized veg (Tesco has carrots, butternut squash and courgette spiralized in tubs) or use a julienne peeler. Scroll to the end for the link-up.

To kick off the challenge I'll share something I made recently: orange chicken with spiralized sweet potato.

To serve 2, you need:
2 sweet potatoes
2 chicken breasts
juice and zest of 1 orange
150ml chicken stock
1/2 tsp cornflour

First here's a quick description of how to use a spiralizer if you haven't seen one before (or got one for Christmas but haven't used it yet!). Mine has three blades to choose from for different thickness noodles. Peel the sweet potato and slice off the end so it sits flat against the blade; insert the spikes on the handle into the other end. As you turn the handle, the sweet potato rotates and is sliced into ribbons. Make sure you have a bowl or plate underneath the spiralizer to catch them!

I ended up with quite a pile of noodles - or what I have seen called 'voodles' - vegetable noodles.

To make the chicken, pan fry the chicken breasts in the orange juice and stock. When the chicken breasts are cooked, remove from the pan and add the cornflour, mixed separately with 1 tbsp. water. Stir and simmer the liquid until it thickens.

The sweet potato noodles take literally just a couple of minutes to cook - any more and they will turn to mush. You could briefly bring them to the boil in a pan of water or you can fry them, or even cook them with the chicken in the orange sauce. I did mine in an inch of water in a saucepan.

Serve the chicken on the bed of sweet potato noodles and pour the orange sauce over the top - a very healthy low carb meal!