Roast chicken and pumpkin, black lentils and hazelnut picada
Great colours: orange pumpkin, black lentils, tawny hazelnuts, golden chicken skin. Picada is a Spanish mixture – usually of breadcrumbs, nuts, garlic, herbs and a little liquid – added to a dish towards the end of cooking to thicken it. But lately picadas have also been used as a finely chopped mixture of ingredients thrown over a dish at the end to heighten and freshen flavours.
I read about a khoresh in Najmieh Batmanglij’s wonderful book Food of Life: Ancient Persian and Modern Iranian Cooking and Ceremonies. It was mostly made from pistachios – a whole 450g (1lb) of them – with the same amount of chicken, no vegetables and a pretty hefty swig of rose water. This is based on that (Batmanglij’s recipe also includes verjuice and saffron) but I’ve messed around with the dish. It uses ingredients I love (and that are common in Moroccan cookery, too), such as saffron and flower water, producing a dish that is scented and unusual to European and American taste buds.
I have also made this with dill instead of mint and that works very well – it’s different, but just as good – while cooked broad beans (whose skins you’ve slipped off) are a lovely addition, too.
¼–½ tsp rose waterbe careful as you are adding this
250g9oz spinach, washed, coarse stalks removed, leaves torn
about 40 mint leavestorn
50g1¾oz pistachios, roughly chopped
rose petalsto serve (optional)
Instructies
Cut the thighs in half, so that you are left with two pieces that are rough rectangles.
Heat the oil in a sauté pan and fry the chicken in batches so it takes a good golden colour on both sides.
You don’t want to cook the chicken through, just colour it.
As the chicken is ready, remove it to a dish.
When all the chicken is done, add the onions to the pan and fry over a medium-low heat until they are golden and starting to soften.
Add the turmeric and pepper and cook for another minute, then pour in the verjuice and stock.
Bring to the boil, then reduce the heat to a very gentle simmer and return the chicken – and any juices that have run out of it – to the pan.
Season with salt, cover and cook for 25 minutes, removing the lid for the final 10 minutes.
Add the saffron, stir it round in the juices to help it dissolve and add the rose water (you don’t want to overdo this and different brands have varying strengths, so add carefully and taste as you do so).
Add the spinach gradually, adding each amount when the rest has wilted.
Stir in the mint, taste to check for seasoning, then add the pistachios and rose petals (if using).
Serve with rice.
I also like a bowl of yogurt with some crushed garlic and 1 tbsp of extra virgin olive oil stirred into it.
Roast chicken with mushroom and sage butter under the skin
Stuffing a chicken that is to be roasted with butter, just under the skin, is one of the easiest ways you can give it a bit of va va voom and ensure a moist bird, too. The key thing is to lift the skin on the breast very carefully, you mustn’t tear it or the butter just runs out.
Pour some boiling water over the wild mushrooms and leave to soak for 30 minutes.
Drain (you can keep the soaking liquid for a mushroom soup or risotto) and chop the mushrooms.
Melt 15g (½oz) of the butter in a frying pan and sauté the fresh mushrooms until they are golden brown and quite dry: mushrooms throw moisture out as they cook and you need this to evaporate.
Add the wild mushrooms, stir around and cook for another couple of minutes.
Season with salt and pepper.
Scrape the mushrooms into a dish and leave to cool completely.
Mix the shallots and garlic in with the mushrooms, add a squeeze of lemon juice and the sage leaves.
Now add the remaining butter and mash everything together.
Put the butter mixture into the fridge to firm up.
When you’re ready to cook, preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/gas mark 4.
Put the chicken into a small roasting tin or ovenproof dish.
Loosen the skin of the chicken, starting with the skin on the breast: carefully lift the skin and put your fingers in between the skin and the flesh, working your way down over the skin on the legs, too.
You must be careful not to tear the skin.
Now push the cold mushroom butter under the skin, spreading it down over the legs.
Press the top of the chicken skin once you’ve used up all the butter, to make sure it is fairly evenly distributed.
Season the bird with salt and pepper.
Put the chicken into the hot oven and cook for one hour, basting every so often.
Rest for 10 minutes under a double layer of foil.
I love this with pumpkin purée – you can fry some more sage leaves and put them on top of the purée – and tagliatelle or orzo, or a brown and wild rice pilaf.
An old-fashioned classic, this is a lovely main course for a French bistro-style meal. Just make sure – since this requires some last-minute attention – that you have an easy starter and pudding to go either side of it. In fact one of those ‘eat-while-you-stand-around’ starters (offer saucisson, croûtes with pâté, hard-boiled quail’s eggs and tapenade, that kind of thing) is a good idea, so you cook the chicken while you all graze.
Chicken breasts with wild mushroom sauce and puy lentils
For years this was my ‘posh dinner party’ number. People used to want a sauce and a bit of cream. Times have changed, but this is still a lovely dish. You can make the sauce and lentils ahead of time and reheat them, which makes it convenient, too.
6skin-on boneless chicken breaststhe best you can afford, each 150g (5½oz)
20g¾oz unsalted butter
a splash of groundnut or rapeseed oil
FOR THE LENTILS
2tbspolive oil
1smallonionfinely chopped
1carrotfinely chopped
1celery stickfinely chopped
300g10½oz Puy or Umbrian lentils
450ml16fl oz chicken stock, more if needed (optional)
1bay leaf
2tspsherry vinegar
2tbspextra virgin olive oil
1½tbspfinely chopped flat-leaf parsley leaves
Instructies
Start with the sauce, which you can make in advance if you want and reheat at the last minute.
Pour 75ml (2½fl oz) of boiling water over the dried mushrooms and leave to soak for 15 minutes.
Melt the butter and sauté the other mushrooms until well coloured.
Drain the wild mushrooms, reserving the soaking liquor, and chop any that are large.
Add to the mushrooms in the pan and cook for another minute.
Pour on the stock and soaking liquor and cook until the liquid has reduced by two-thirds.
Add the cream and simmer until the sauce coats the back of a spoon.
Taste and season, you shouldn’t need any salt because of the reduced chicken stock.
Allow the chicken breasts to come to room temperature.
For the lentils, heat the regular oil in a heavy-based pan and gently sauté the onion, carrot and celery for 10 minutes.
Add the lentils, stock and bay leaf and bring to the boil, then reduce the heat to a simmer and cook, covered, for 20–25 minutes, or until the lentils are cooked but still have a little bite.
(Keep an eye on them as they turn mushy very quickly.
) By the end of the cooking time the stock should have been absorbed (you may need a little more stock or water during cooking).
Gently stir in the vinegar, virgin oil and parsley, check for seasoning and cover to keep warm.
Heat the butter and oil for the chicken in a large frying pan.
Season the chicken and put it in the pan, skin side down.
Cook for two minutes on each side over a medium heat, then reduce the heat and cook for six or so minutes, turning, until cooked through but still moist.
Quickly reheat the sauce.
Either leave the breasts whole or cut them, on a slight angle, into two or three pieces.
Put some lentils into the centre of six warmed plates, put a chicken breast on top of each serving and spoon some of the sauce around.
This was inspired by Richard Olney. He has quite a few recipes for chicken with some kind of stuffing under the skin in his classic book Simple French Food (if you like serious food writing and elegant prose, this should be on your book shelf). One of the joys of a dish such as this is that it needs little else. It already contains vegetables and its own kind of ‘embellishment’. A green salad or some roast tomatoes and a grain or bread is all you need with it. Oh, and a bottle of decent wine.
Mix the lemon zest, half the garlic and 3½ tbsp of olive oil together and rub all over the chicken, inside and out.
Cover loosely with cling film and leave to marinate in the fridge, turning every so often, for a couple of hours.
Bring to room temperature before cooking.
Trim the tops and bottoms from the courgettes, then cut them into julienne strips.
Layer them up in a colander, sprinkling with the salt as you do so.
Set over a bowl so that the juices can drip out.
You really need to do this as you need to dry the courgettes before cooking.
Once they’ve drained for one hour, take handfuls and squeeze out as much moisture as you can, really well.
Melt half the butter in a frying pan and sauté the courgettes for 10 minutes.
They should be golden.
Season with pepper (you won’t need salt) and set aside.
Sauté the onion in the rest of the butter in the same pan until soft but not coloured.
Add the rest of the garlic and cook for another three minutes or so.
Leave the courgettes and the onion mixture to cool completely.
Mash the ricotta in a bowl and add the cooled vegetables, the Parmesan, egg, breadcrumbs and basil.
Taste for seasoning.
Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/gas mark 4.
Carefully loosen the skin of the chicken breast and legs as much as possible, without tearing, to create an area you can stuff (see technique for Roast chicken with mushrooms and sage butter under the skin).
Now take small handfuls of the ricotta mixture and work it in under the skin, pressing the skin on top to spread the stuffing.
All the stuffing should go in.
Season the outside of the chicken.
Roast in the hot oven for 1½ hours, basting from time to time.
Leave to rest – well insulated under a double layer of foil – for 15 minutes before serving.
Chicken braised with shallots and chicory on jerusalem artichoke purée
A dish of contrasts – bitter chicory, sweet shallots and nutty Jerusalem artichokes – that comes together very elegantly. I love the colours, too. The palette is completely limited, which gives it a kind of earthy, restrained beauty.
8skin-on bone-in chicken thighsor a mixture of joints
salt and pepper
4heads of chicorynice fat ones if possible, halved lengthways
16shallots
250ml9fl oz chicken stock
3sprigs of thymeplus thyme leaves to serve
FOR THE PURÉE
750g1lb 10oz Jerusalem artichokes
good squeeze of lemon juice
225ml8fl oz double cream, plus more if needed
50ml2fl oz chicken stock, plus more if needed
25gscant 1oz unsalted butter
grating of fresh nutmeg
Instructies
Start with the chicken.
Heat the oil and butter in a sauté pan and brown the chicken pieces on all sides, seasoning with salt and pepper.
Make sure you don’t burn the fat.
Remove the chicken and set aside.
Now colour the cut sides of the chicory in the fat as well – you want it tinged with gold – then remove and set this aside, too.
Add the shallots to the pan and colour those on the outside as well.
Return the chicken to the sauté pan with the shallots and add the stock and sprigs of thyme.
Bring to the boil, then immediately reduce the heat to low, cover and simmer very gently for about 20 minutes.
Add the chicory to the pan – try and arrange everything in a single layer – and cook for another 15 minutes.
Make sure that there is still stock left in which to cook the chicory.
If there is too much liquid, then leave the lid off for the next bit of cooking, so it can reduce.
The dish is cooked when the juices in the chicken run clear with no trace of pink and the chicory is completely tender.
Taste the cooking liquids: because you have reduced stock, you shouldn’t need any more salt.
Meanwhile, to make the purée, cut the Jerusalem artichokes into chunks.
I don’t bother to peel them, but you can if you want.
As you cut them up, immediately drop them in a pan of water to which you have added a good squeeze of lemon juice (this stops the artichokes discolouring).
Bring the water to the boil and cook the artichokes until tender.
Drain the artichokes and return them to the pan.
Bring to the boil with the cream, stock, butter, nutmeg and seasoning.
Heat through, then purée in a blender.
Taste for seasoning and judge whether you need to add any more cream or stock (or water) for texture and thickness.
You can use vine leaves preserved in brine (they come both in packets and jars) if you can’t get hold of fresh leaves, but you might find you have them in your own garden (I did, without knowing it), or a neighbour might have them. I first ate this dish in Turkey, where it was made with quail. The Turks certainly know how to make a fuss of cherries.
Roast chicken stuffed with black pudding and apple and mustard sauce
A good autumnal spin on the roast chicken Sunday lunch. Get good-quality black pudding; I use Clonakilty, though it’s not available everywhere. Preparing the sauce ahead makes things easy.
I was given this recipe years ago by a chef in a pub in London and have served it every year since, usually around Easter time. I think it’s the pistachios that make it; the general greenness and lightness of the dish means it is very right for spring. Serve with spring greens or a big salad of pea shoots and watercress and some sautéed or boiled baby potatoes.
