I’m back in the kitchen! For your enjoyment and consumption, I bring you this spicy, sweet, savory sauce with cherries, orange, and cayenne pepper. While I served the sauce over chicken, this would also be great over pork chops or a pork tenderloin. I used a blood orange for this recipe, but a regular navel orange would work just fine. Blood oranges can be hard to find, though usually available until Spring, and they have a slightly raspberry taste to them.
I also used a fancy Cranberry-Blood Orange Tea Jam from Republic of Tea in place of the preserves, but you could substitute a number of jams or jellies: orange marmalade, cherry preserves, even another berry-flavored jelly. Using frozen cherries cuts down on prep time and allows this recipe to be made in any season, but pitted fresh cherries would be great too.
4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1 bag (12 oz) frozen unsweetened dark sweet cherries, thawed
1/4 cup red wine
1/2 chopped onion
1 tsp minced garlic
1 orange, zest and juice
1/8 tsp salt
1/8 tsp cayenne (red) pepper
1/8 tsp cumin
1 tbsp cherry preserves
Preheat oven to 350F or broiler. Lightly coat a baking sheet or broiler pan with cooking spray.
Season chicken with salt and black pepper as desired. Bake or broil 20-25 minutes until cooked through and no longer pink.
Meanwhile, combine onion and garlic in a medium saucepan coated lightly in cooking spray. Saute over medium heat for 3-5 minutes.
Add cherries with any liquid from the bag and red wine. Using the back of a spoon, lightly rush the cherries (leave some cherries whole). Zest and juice orange into saucepan. Add remaining ingredients and stir well. Bring to boil and simmer for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.
To serve, spoon hot sauce over chicken breasts. Shown with steamed asparagus and Spicy Sweet Potatoes (the Spicy Cherry Sauce goes great with those potatoes!).
