Slow Cooker Orange Chicken & Broccoli

I love orange chicken, but it's one of those recipes that is heavily fried and I try my best to stay away from eating too much fried food. I thought up this recipe when I was on another slow cooker kick this past week and thought it came out delicious. Plus, since I was using my slow cooker I got the treat of coming home to a complete, cooked meal when I came home from work. 

Moments like that make life seem so much less hectic for a brief moment, after working all day, commuting home and running a few miles after work it's just a breath of relief to come in to dinner already cooked and ready to be eaten. All I needed to do was cook up a bit of rice and that's it, dinner was served. 

One Bite One-Derland - FoodBuzz's December 24x24

It's a bit of an understatement to say I was thrilled when I found out I was chosen to host a 24x24 session for the month of December. I had this idea in my head to do a one bite dinner, a dinner full of amuse bouche's if you will. If you're not familiar with the term amuse bouche literally means to amuse your mouth, what it is, is one bite of food packed with delicious flavor. On Top Chef and other cooking shows whenever the contestants are challenged to make an amuse bouche they must make one bite of food be so memorable that no other bite of food is needed. It sounded like a challenge I was willing to take on.

The menu came together on my shopping trip to Whole Foods and then even more so in my kitchen brainstorming with my husband. He's got a great mind for stuff like this and really helped a ton in pulling it all together. It was a small dinner party with a ton of great food and even better company. The menu ultimately ended up consisting of lamb sliders, scallops with pancetta, lobster and avocado sushi, bacon wrapped chicken, cream cheese and crab rangoons. The entire meal was paired with blood orange soda which was light and sweet and totally delicious. For dessert we used wonton wrappers to make a delicious banana and honey dessert that is a quick and surefire dessert everyone will love.