In a tangy and sweet orange sauce, beef is stir-fried with peppers, cauliflower, and carrots.
| Prep Time: | 15 mins |
| Cook Time: | 1 hr |
| Additional Time: | 1 hr |
| Total Time: | 2 hrs 15 mins |
| Servings: | 2 |
| Yield: | 2 servings |
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
- 1 lemon, zested and juiced
- 1 orange, zested and juiced
- 3 cloves garlic, chopped
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- freshly ground black pepper to taste
- 2 Cornish game hens
- 2 cups orange juice
- ½ cup soy sauce
- ½ cup honey
- ¼ cup Dijon mustard
- ¼ cup finely diced onion
- 2 teaspoons ground ginger
- freshly ground black pepper to taste
Instructions
- Mix olive oil, 1 tablespoon Dijon mustard, lemon zest and juice, orange zest and juice, garlic, salt, and black pepper together in a large resealable bag. Add hens, seal bag, and coat hens with marinade. Refrigerate for at least 1 hour, flipping the bag 1 or 2 times to redistribute marinade.
- Preheat oven to 450 degrees F (230 degrees C).
- Mix orange juice, soy sauce, honey, 1/4 cup Dijon mustard, onion, ginger, and black pepper together in a bowl.
- Remove hens from marinade and transfer to a roasting pan, discarding leftover marinade.
- Roast hens in the preheated oven for 50 minutes. Brush hens with orange glaze and roast for 5 more minutes. Flip hens, brush with more glaze, and roast until meat is no longer pink in the center, about 5 more minutes. An instant-read thermometer inserted near the bone should read 165 degrees F (74 degrees C).
- The nutrition data for this recipe includes the full amount of the marinade ingredients. The actual amount of the marinade consumed will vary.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 1235 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 129 g |
| Cholesterol | 302 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 7 g |
| Protein | 60 g |
| Saturated Fat | 14 g |
| Sodium | 5663 mg |
| Sugars | 100 g |
| Fat | 56 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
These cornish hens were a hit! I agree with others that the sauce recipe ingredients need to be cut in half. I baked these at 425 degrees for 50 minutes and they were not over/under cooked, but just right. For the sauce, I replaced onions with green onions for added flavor and cooked it on the stovetop with some corn starch to thicken it a bit. I brushed the sauce on the bottom without turning them over to keep the crispiness on top. The sauce left in the pan I drizzled on top of the cornish hens which really made them taste good. I would definitely make it again.
I made this for Easter dinner and loved the citrus flavors throughout. I marinated the hens overnight to get the most flavor possible. Changed up the baking times/temperature a bit based on other reviewers opinions, another recipe and the package instructions. Baked at 425 for 20 min., then at 350 for another 20 min. with the extra 10 min. time dedicated to basting. I did have to cover the tender, small drumsticks with foil as they were getting browned too fast. Didn’t want them to dry out. I would make this recipe again. Oh, like other reviewers reported, there was way too much sauce, even though I only made 1/2 of the recipe. I could have made 1/4 of the recipe and still would have had to throw out much of the sauce…and I had 3 Cornish hens! The next time, I will make 1/4 of the sauce recipe to avoid waste.
i made this and think 450 temp is too high. the skin of the hens were burnt and the chicken wasn’t done cooking.. also agree with the other reviews.. way too much glaze was made and was wasteful.
My husband rated the dish as a 3.5 to a 4. I thickened up the sauce with corn starch. It was easy and something new to try.
Well, there is a problem with the recipe. What do you do with 3 cups of sauce for two game hens? Brush the hens twice and you still have two and three quarters cups. The sauce is not thicken, so it runs everywhere.
This was a HUGE hit for my family at Christmas. The sauce is to die for and I used freshly picked Myers lemons for the juice and zest which gave it a deeper lemon flavor. I did simmer the sauce for a few hours to make a reduction. MY daughter and husband asked for the leftover sauce to bring home with theme lol
Best Cornish Hen recipe I ever made. I halved the glaze ingredients. I simmered the glaze ingredients on the stove and thickened it slightly with cornstarch/water. I baked at 425 for a total of 45 minutes and it was definitely done.
Delicious recipe. Wonderful flavours & easy to make. Impressive dish.
The taste was ok and it was moist. It had a nice brown crispy texture on top until I flipped it at the end and lost that crispiness in the juices so I would not flip it at the end. Not sure I’d make it again but it was ok.
Terrific recipe. I Gave it 4 stars because as others, I realized that I needed much less sauce than the recipe called for. So I only made half of the amount And I still had left over sauce. I will use it for another recipe. It was actually a good thing in the end! The 45O degree oven was just right, as you are opening the oven to baste the hens. My family thoroughly enjoyed this recipe. It was a nice feeling! Thanks for the great recipe.
This sauce is to die for ,the hen came out moist and full of flavor
1.2.17 I had concerns that 450ºF was too high for this hen, so I cut it back to 425ºF, and the temperature still reached 170ºF (and I used an oven temperature probe) in about 32 minutes. These birds would have been totally burned up and overcooked at 50 minutes @ 450ºF, and that’s not even allowing for the additional time for the sauce to be brushed on. Secondly, although the sauce is tasty, this is waaaaaay too much sauce for two cornish hens. I saved half the sauce, thickened it with a cornstarch slurry, served the sauce at the table with the hens, and I still had more sauce than I needed. IMO this recipe has a few issues and needs some tweaking. On the positive side, it’s worth the effort because these little birds were tasty! My review is based on the modifications I made to the recipe and how the hens turned out with the changes.