Rice with Orange Chicken & Green Beans
Two hundred and twenty-four grams of frozen green beans. That is more vegetable than everything else on this plate combined. The chicken gets 84 grams — cubed, tossed in olive oil with cumin and chili powder, and pan-fried for three minutes before the real move happens.
Fresh-squeezed orange juice hits the hot pan alongside a tablespoon of honey. Three minutes of reduction. The liquid tightens into a sticky citrus glaze that coats the chicken and beans while the brown rice finishes in its own pot. 757 calories, 32 grams of protein, 15 grams of fiber, 15 minutes.
Ingredients
- brown rice 3 ounces
- green beans (frozen) 8 ounces
- chicken breast 3 ounces
- olive oil 1.5 tablespoon
- ground cumin 0.5 teaspoon
- chili powder 1 pinch
- orange 1
- honey 1 tablespoon
Method
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Cook the rice according to the package instructions. Put the green beans in a pot of water and cook them until tender, about 6 minutes.
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Cut the chicken breast into cubes and place in a bowl with the oil, cumin, and chili powder.
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Juice the orange.
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Heat a pan and cook the chicken pieces for 3 minutes. Add the drained beans along with the orange juice and honey. Cook for about 3 minutes until the sauce thickens slightly. Season with pepper and salt.
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Serve the orange chicken with the rice.
Add the orange juice to the pan before the honey. The juice needs a moment to start reducing, and the liquid shields the honey from direct contact with the hot surface — you get a smooth glaze instead of bitter burnt sugar.
Behind this recipe
99 grams of carbs in one meal — is that too much?
It depends on your total daily intake, not when you eat them. Research comparing evening carb consumption to daytime carb consumption found no difference in fat loss when total daily calories stayed the same. The 99 grams here come from brown rice, honey, orange juice, and green beans — the number is high relative to low-carb standards, but the timing does not determine whether those carbs are stored as fat. Your total daily energy balance does.
Read the full evidence reviewCan I use fresh green beans instead of frozen?
Yes. Fresh green beans work with roughly the same cook time — trim the ends and blanch for 5 to 7 minutes until tender. Frozen green beans are already blanched before freezing, so they need no trimming and cook evenly from the bag. The fiber content holds up with both, and the orange glaze coats fresh beans just as well.
Where does the 32 grams of protein come from?
Mostly from the 84 grams of chicken breast, which contributes the largest share. Brown rice and green beans each add smaller amounts. The 32-gram total is the combined contribution of every ingredient on the plate — not just the chicken.
