Recipes

Poule au pot with caper and shallot cream

Poule au pot with caper and shallot cream

Leave out the chicken livers from the stuffing if you prefer, but if so increase the amount of bacon by 50g (1¾oz). You don’t have to serve the cream sauce and it isn’t authentic, just something I do myself. A pot of Dijon mustard suffices, or go Italian and serve with Salsa verde
Couverts6
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Ingredients

FOR THE STUFFING

  • 15 g ½oz unsalted butter
  • 150 g 5½oz bacon, chopped
  • 1 small onion finely chopped
  • 2 garlic cloves finely chopped
  • 2 chicken livers chopped
  • 60 g 2oz fresh breadcrumbs
  • 1 small egg lightly beaten
  • handful of chopped parsley
  • good grating of fresh nutmeg
  • finely grated zest of ½ lemon

FOR THE CHICKEN

  • 1.4 kg 3lb 3½oz chicken
  • 3 leeks
  • 1 celery stick
  • 3 sprigs of thyme
  • small bunch of parsley stalks
  • 2 bay leaves
  • 8 black peppercorns
  • 1 onion quartered
  • 12 slim carrots peeled
  • 1.5 litres 2 pints 13fl oz chicken stock, or water
  • about 12 small waxy potatoes

FOR THE SAUCE

Instructions

  • To make the stuffing, melt the butter in a frying pan and add the bacon and onion.
  • Sauté until the onion is soft and pale gold.
  • Add the garlic and chicken livers and cook for a couple of minutes more.
  • Put into a bowl, add all the other ingredients and season well.
  • Remove the fat from round the cavity of the chicken and stuff it, sewing it up with a poultry needle, or using a couple of skewers to keep it secure.
  • Tie up the chicken legs to keep the shape neat (not essential but it does look better).
  • Remove the coarser outer leaves from the leeks and cut off the dark tops and trim the bases.
  • Cut into 6cm (2½in) lengths and wash thoroughly to remove any trapped soil.
  • Cut the celery in half and tie it in a bundle with the thyme, parsley stalks and bay leaves to make a nice fat bouquet garni.
  • Put this into a pot with the chicken, peppercorns, quartered onion, carrots and stock or water.
  • Bring to the boil, then immediately reduce the heat, cover and cook really gently for 1½ hours.
  • Fifteen minutes before the end of cooking time, add the leeks and boil the potatoes (I like to cook the potatoes separately or they make the broth cloudy).
  • Remove the onion and the bouquet garni.
  • To make the sauce, add the lemon juice to the cream – it will thicken as you stir it in – then add everything else.
  • Check for seasoning and balance.
  • A whole chicken that’s been poached – without browning – isn’t a thing of beauty, so I tend to remove the meat and put it on a platter with the vegetables and stuffing and provide a big jug of the broth (or you can prepare a single plate for each person).
  • I like it best served in soup plates (there’s room for the broth).
  • Offer the creamy sauce, or whatever sauce you want to serve, and some Dijon mustard on the side.
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Course; Chicken / Sauce

Pot-roast chicken with figs

Pot-roast chicken with figs

Pot-roast chicken often seems like a pure, ‘clean’ sort of meal, not a luxurious one. This, however, because of the figs, honey and Armagnac, is quite grand, more than a little special.
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Ingredients

  • 1½ tbsp olive oil
  • salt and pepper
  • 1.8 kg 4lb chicken
  • 1 large onion roughly chopped
  • 2 tbsp Armagnac
  • 125 ml 4fl oz dry white wine
  • 125 ml 4fl oz chicken stock
  • 4 sprigs of thyme
  • 1 bay leaf
  • 18 figs stalks snipped, halved
  • 1 tbsp cider vinegar
  • 2 tbsp honey
  • 20 g ¾oz cold unsalted butter,
  • cut into cubes

Instructions

  • Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/gas mark 4.
  • Heat the olive oil, season the chicken and brown it all over.
  • Remove the chicken.
  • Pour off all but 1½ tbsp of the fat from the pan and cook the onion in this over a medium heat until soft and golden.
  • Deglaze the pan with the Armagnac, scraping with a wooden spoon to remove all the sticky bits, then add the wine, stock, thyme and bay leaf.
  • Add a good grinding of black pepper.
  • Return the chicken and any juices that have run out of it.
  • Cover, put into the oven and cook for 70 minutes, then take the lid off and cook for another 20 minutes.
  • Baste every so often.
  • Strain off the cooking juices.
  • Cover the chicken to keep warm.
  • Skim the fat from the cooking juices.
  • Put the juices into a frying pan (one that will hold the figs in a single layer) and boil to reduce them.
  • You want a liquid that is slightly syrupy.
  • Reduce the heat and add the figs, vinegar and honey, to flavour the juices and make the figs tender and glossy, about four minutes.
  • Remove the figs with a slotted spoon and whisk in the cold butter gradually; it makes the sauce rich and shiny.

Notes & Wine Advice

Serve the chicken – either whole or jointed – on a warm platter with the figs around it and the sauce in a heated jug on the side.
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Course; Chicken

Chicken with leeks, apples and cider

Chicken with leeks, apples and cider

This is my partner’s favourite dish (and the first thing I ever cooked for him) so it’s quite special to me. Perfect comfort food. Although it could just as easily come from Cornwall or Devon (because of the cider), it really takes me to Normandy.
Couverts4
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Ingredients

  • salt and pepper
  • 8 skin-on bone-in chicken thighs or a mixture of joints
  • 40 g 1½oz unsalted butter
  • 700 g 1lb 9oz leeks
  • 2 dessert apples
  • 1 tbsp plain flour
  • 500 ml 18fl oz dry cider
  • 6 sprigs of thyme plus leaves from 2 more sprigs to serve
  • 150 ml 5fl oz double cream
  • 1 tsp caster sugar

Instructions

  • Season the chicken pieces and heat 25g (scant 1oz) of the butter in a large sauté pan (one which has a lid) or a wide casserole.
  • Brown the chicken on both sides and then set the pieces aside while you cook the leeks.
  • (Make sure not to burn the butter.
  • )
  • Remove the tough outer leaves from the leeks.
  • Trim the bases and cut off the tough, very dark leaves at the top.
  • Wash the leeks really well, making sure that you get rid of any soil that is lodged in them.
  • Cut into about 3cm (1¼in) lengths.
  • Add the leeks to the fat in the pan in which you cooked the chicken and sauté without browning for about 10 minutes; they should soften but not become sloppy.
  • Meanwhile, peel one of the apples, halve and cut into wedges.
  • Melt the remaining butter in a small frying pan and gently brown the wedges on each side.
  • Leave until you need them.
  • Add the flour to the leeks and turn them over in the juices.
  • Continue to cook for a couple of minutes.
  • Take the pan off the heat and slowly add the cider, stirring all the time.
  • Return to the heat, bring to the boil, then add the chicken, sprigs of thyme and the sautéed apple (don’t wash the apple pan).
  • Immediately reduce the heat to a simmer, put the lid on and leave to cook over a low heat for about 35 minutes.
  • The chicken should be cooked through, with no trace of pink.
  • Lift the chicken pieces out of the casserole and simmer the cooking juices until reduced by about one-third.
  • Add the cream, bring to the boil and cook for a couple of minutes.
  • Peel and cut the other apple into wedges and put in the frying pan in which you cooked the first apple.
  • Sauté gently, adding the caster sugar to help the slices caramelize nicely on the outside.
  • Cook until the apple slices are tender.
  • Return the chicken to the sauce and heat gently.
  • At the last minute, add the newly sautéed apples, sprinkle with the thyme leaves and serve.
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Course; Chicken / Fruit

Hot and sweet lime chicken wings

Hot and sweet lime chicken wings

Hot, burnished and sticky, this is barbecue food without the barbecue. These are great in the summer when you can’t be bothered to put the barbecue on and just as good at Hallowe’en or Guy Fawkes bonfire parties. Push the chilli quota higher if you want to.
Couverts4
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Ingredients

  • finely grated zest of 6 limes plus the juice of 8, plus lime wedges to serve
  • 4 red chillies finely sliced (don’t remove the seeds)
  • 2 green chillies deseeded and finely sliced
  • 8 garlic cloves crushed
  • 290 g 10¼oz lime marmalade
  • 100 g 3½oz dark soft brown sugar
  • 4 cm 1½in root ginger, peeled and very finely chopped
  • 20 chicken wings
  • roughly chopped coriander to serve
  • soured cream or Greek yogurt to serve

Instructions

  • Mix all the ingredients except the chicken, coriander and soured cream in a bowl, pressing the marmalade with the back of a spoon to break it down.
  • Put the chicken wings into this and turn them all over with your hands, making sure they get well coated.
  • Cover and marinate in the fridge for a couple of hours.
  • Bring to room temperature before cooking.
  • When you’re ready to cook, preheat the oven to 210°C/410°F/gas mark 6½.
  • Lay the chicken wings in a single layer in a couple of roasting tins (if you put them on top of each other, they will sweat rather than brown).
  • Cook in the hot oven for 40 minutes, turning them over halfway through.
  • If they are getting too dark in colour (because of the sugars burning), cover them with foil.
  • Sprinkle with coriander and serve on a big platter with a plain green salad, or an avocado and leaf salad, and rice.
  • Lime wedges – chargrilled or fresh – look great on the platter, too.
  • Offer little bowls of soured cream or Greek yogurt to temper the heat.
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Course; Chicken

Chicken pot-roasted in milk, bay and nutmeg

Chicken pot-roasted in milk, bay and nutmeg

I’ve never been keen on the Italian dish of pork cooked in milk, but I was convinced to try this by Faith Durand who runs www.thekitchn.com website in the States. She heard about it from Jamie Oliver and made some adjustments, and I have made my own. Faith thinks it is the best chicken recipe in the world and my children would be inclined to agree with her. You won’t believe me until you try it, but it is a great dish: the chicken stays completely succulent and becomes sweet, imbued with and enriched by the flavourings in the milk. The nutmeggy milk makes it a bit like eating roast chicken with bread sauce (but without the hassle of making bread sauce). One of the most comforting dishes you could wish for.
Couverts6
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Ingredients

  • 25 g scant 1oz unsalted butter
  • 2 tbsp olive oil
  • salt and pepper
  • 1.8 kg 4lb chicken
  • 350 ml 12fl oz whole milk
  • 10 garlic cloves peeled but left whole
  • 3 bay leaves
  • good grating of nutmeg
  • finely grated zest of 2 unwaxed lemons

Instructions

  • Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/gas mark 4.
  • Heat the butter and olive oil in a pan that can hold the chicken and has a lid.
  • Season the bird, tie the legs together if you want and brown it all over, using two big forks or wooden spoons to turn the chicken, seasoning it as you go.
  • Try to avoid piercing the skin.
  • Pour off the fat; you don’t need to throw it out, you can keep it to fry potatoes.
  • Add the milk, garlic, bay leaves, nutmeg and lemon zest to the pot.
  • Bring to just under the boil, then remove from the heat.
  • Put a lid on the pot and cook in the hot oven for 1½ hours, removing the lid halfway through cooking.
  • Baste occasionally, spooning the milk up over the bird.
  • At the end of cooking time the bird will be succulent and golden and the juices will be copious and slightly curdled.
  • Squash the garlic cloves with the back of a fork so they break down and flavour the juices.
  • Taste; you may want to add a little more nutmeg.

Notes & Wine Advice

Serve – I love it with orzo or a rice pilaf – spooning the juices over the chicken and whatever starch you choose for a side dish. The vegetable you choose depends on the time of year. In winter it’s good with roast carrots, in the summer roast tomatoes and a salad of bitter leaves.
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Course; Chicken

Soothing north indian chicken

Soothing north indian chicken

This is not one of those head-spinningly rich or complexly spiced Indian dishes; it’s simple and modest, sort of the Indian equivalent of chicken soup or shepherd’s pie. It needs something soothing on the side, such as dal, or greens fried with ginger and garlic.
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Equipment

  • Saucepan

Ingredients

  • 8 skinless bone-in chicken thighs
  • 2 tbsp ghee or groundnut oil
  • 2 tsp cumin seeds
  • ½ tsp pepper
  • 1 large onion grated
  • 8 garlic cloves grated
  • 30 g 1oz root ginger, peeled and grated
  • 1 tbsp coriander seeds toasted and ground
  • 1 red chilli halved, deseeded and sliced
  • 1 green chilli halved, deseeded and sliced
  • 4 tbsp plain yogurt
  • good squeeze of lime juice
  • 1 tsp soft light brown sugar optional
  • salt
  • small bunch of coriander roughly chopped

Instructions

  • Put the chicken into a saucepan, pour in 500ml (18fl oz) of water and bring to the boil.
  • Immediately reduce the heat so the water is gently simmering, cover and cook for 35 minutes, or until the chicken is just cooked through.
  • Lift the chicken out with a slotted spoon and set aside.
  • Measure the cooking liquid and add enough water to make it up to 500ml (18fl oz) once more.
  • Rinse out the saucepan, dry it, then heat the ghee or groundnut oil in it over a medium heat.
  • Add the cumin seeds and pepper and cook for 30 seconds, then add the grated onion, garlic and ginger.
  • Cook until the mixture is soft and pale gold, a matter of seven or eight minutes, then add the ground coriander seeds and both chillies.
  • Cook for another two minutes, then reduce the heat and stir in the yogurt.
  • Now stir in the reserved cooking liquor, adding a little at a time.
  • Return the chicken to the pot, increase the heat so the chicken is hot right through, then reduce the heat once more and simmer for about four minutes.
  • Don’t boil the mixture.
  • Add the lime juice and sugar (if using) and season with salt.
  • Taste to check the seasoning.
  • Throw in the coriander and heat for 15 seconds so it can start to release its fragrance.
  • Serve immediately.
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Course; Chicken
Cuisine; India

Thyme-roasted chicken with breton onion sauce

Thyme-roasted chicken with breton onion sauce

This is really old-fashioned and a dream of a dish. I used to make sauce soubise (made from béchamel and puréed onions) from time to time for roast lamb, but never thought of putting an onion sauce with chicken. Then I read about Breton onion sauce (similar to sauce soubise) in one of my favourite cookbooks, Jenny Baker’s Cuisine Grandmère (it’s out of print but try to track down a copy, it’s a gem). She suggested serving it with roast chicken. My Breton sauce is based on her recipe. It’s basically a cream-enriched béchamel mixed with a soft, melting mass of cooked onions and a good slug of Calvados. It’s best to back-time the béchamel to be ready just when the chicken has rested. You can do the onion component in advance, but reheating béchamel is always a bit of a pain.
Couverts6
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Ingredients

FOR THE CHICKEN

  • 1.8 kg 4lb chicken
  • 25 g scant 1oz unsalted butter
  • leaves from 4 sprigs of thyme
  • salt and pepper

FOR THE ONIONS

  • 30 g 1oz unsalted butter, slightly softened
  • 450 g 1lb onions, finely chopped

FOR THE SAUCE

Instructions

  • Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/gas mark 4.
  • Start with the chicken.
  • Mash the butter with the thyme, salt and pepper.
  • Carefully loosen the skin over the breast (see technique for Roast chicken with mushrooms and sage butter under the skin).
  • Using your fingers, spread about half of the butter under the skin, without tearing it.
  • Now spread the remainder on the outside of the bird, season and put into a roasting tin.
  • Cook in the hot oven for 1 hour 15 minutes, basting every so often.
  • Now prepare the onions (you can do these ahead of time).
  • Melt the butter in a heavy-based pan and add the onions.
  • Turn them over to coat in the butter, add 2 tbsp of water and cover.
  • Cook over a very low heat until completely soft, being careful not to let them brown.
  • Keep an eye on them, adding a spoonful of water every so often.
  • They will sweat to a lovely sweet softness.
  • When the chicken is cooked allow it to rest, covered in foil, for 15 minutes.
  • To make the sauce put the milk, onion, parsley, peppercorns and bay leaf in a saucepan and slowly bring to just under the boil.
  • Take off the heat and leave for 20 minutes to infuse.
  • Melt the butter in a heavy-based saucepan, add the flour and stir over a medium-low heat for a minute.
  • Take off the heat.
  • Strain in the milk, a little at a time, stirring until smooth.
  • Season and add the nutmeg.
  • Return to the heat and stir until boiling.
  • Reduce the heat and simmer for three minutes.
  • Add the onions with their juices, the crème fraîche, mustard and Calvados and taste for seasoning.
  • Pour into a warm jug.
  • Serve the chicken, its juices and the sauce.
  • Simple accompaniments – French beans or Savoy cabbage, waxy potatoes – are best.
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Course; Chicken

Chicken with thyme and lemon and smashed garlic potatoes

Chicken with thyme and lemon and smashed garlic potatoes

Very simple but very pretty, especially if you can get your hands on thyme flowers. The chicken also works well with lavender. The potatoes are fab. I do them in all sorts of versions. You can daub the top of them with crème fraîche (wicked, but good) or add dried chilli flakes or herbs (not to serve with this chicken dish, but with others). It’s a ‘keeper’ recipe.
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Ingredients

FOR THE POTATOES

FOR THE CHICKEN

  • 1 small skin-on chicken jointed into 8, or a mixture of skin-on bone-in joints
  • 4 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
  • 8 sprigs of thyme and thyme flowers if possible
  • finely grated zest of 1 unwaxed lemon plus the juice of 2

Instructions

  • Preheat the oven to 190°C/375°F/gas mark 5.
  • Boil the potatoes in water with the peeled, whole garlic cloves.
  • When the potatoes are just tender, drain them (discard the garlic), put the potatoes into an ovenproof dish and press the top of each so it is a little crushed, but stays in one piece (I use the end of a rolling pin, but a potato masher is good, too).
  • Add the grated garlic, olive oil, salt and pepper and turn the potatoes over in all this.
  • Sprinkle with the thyme.
  • Put the chicken joints into an ovenproof dish that you can serve from; a cast-iron, enamel or copper dish would be good.
  • They should be able to lie snugly in a single layer.
  • Add the olive oil, salt and pepper and 6 sprigs of thyme (leave some sprigs whole, just use the leaves of others.
  • No need to be exacting about it).
  • Add the zest and juice of one lemon.
  • Throw the squeezed-out shells in too.
  • Toss everything around with your hands.
  • Remove some of the zest of the other lemon with a vegetable peeler and set it aside.
  • Leave all the chicken skin side up and put in the hot oven.
  • After 10 minutes’ cooking, put the potatoes into the oven.
  • They should be roasted for 30 minutes and you need to shake the dish every so often and turn the potatoes over.
  • After the chicken has been in the oven for 30 minutes, add the strips of lemon zest and toss them round in the fat.
  • Cook for a final 10 minutes.
  • Serve the chicken in the dish in which it has been cooked with the leaves from the extra sprigs of thyme and the thyme flowers over the top, with the potatoes.
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Course; Chicken

Chicken, spinach and cheese polpette

Chicken, spinach and cheese polpette

This is a really useful recipe. You can serve these little chicken meatballs with home-made tomato sauce (though leave out the cinnamon) and spaghetti, or with plain (unsauced) spaghetti moistened with olive oil, or in bowls of chicken broth (cook small pasta such as orzo, or long-grain rice, in the broth before adding the polpette). And of course you can just stuff them into wraps with lettuce, tomato and mayo, or serve them with some kind of dip. This mixture makes about 50 polpette and I reckon on serving each person eight if I serve them with pasta (they’re really not very big); more if I’m just serving them with a dip. In principle I don’t agree with the idea of ‘childrens’ food’, but it’s hard to stick to that if you end up with a picky eater in the family. I am always looking for dishes that my nine-year-old will enjoy. And these get the thumbs up. Grown-ups (thankfully) like them just as much.
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Ingredients

  • 500 g 1lb 2oz minced chicken
  • 50 g 1¾oz fresh white or brown breadcrumbs
  • 20 g ¾oz grated Parmesan
  • 60 g 2oz grated Gruyère
  • 2 –3 tbsp olive oil
  • ½ onion or 1 small onion, very finely chopped
  • 2 garlic cloves crushed
  • 200 g 7oz spinach
  • leaves from 3 sprigs of thyme
  • generous grating of nutmeg
  • finely grated zest of 1 unwaxed lemon
  • salt and pepper

Instructions

  • Put the minced chicken in a bowl with the breadcrumbs and the cheeses.
  • Heat 1 tbsp of the olive oil in a frying pan and sauté the onion over a medium to low heat until soft but not coloured.
  • Add the garlic and cook for another two minutes.
  • Leave to cool.
  • Put the spinach in a pan with a couple of tbsp of water and cover.
  • Set over a low heat and allow to wilt, turning the leaves over a couple of times.
  • It will take about four minutes.
  • Drain and leave to cool.
  • Add the cooled onion to the chicken with the thyme, nutmeg, lemon zest and plenty of salt and pepper.
  • Squeeze the excess water from the spinach and chop it finely.
  • Add to the rest of the ingredients and mix everything with your hands.
  • It’s really important that the mixture is well seasoned.
  • Wet your hands – it makes it easier to shape the polpette – and form the mixture into little balls, about the size of a walnut in its shell.
  • Put them on a tray or baking sheet as you prepare them.
  • If you have time, cover them and chill – it helps them stay firmer – but I often just cook them straight off.
  • Heat 1 tbsp of olive oil in a frying pan and cook the polpette in batches over a medium heat, so the outsides get a good colour, allowing each to form a crust before turning it over.
  • You need to cook and turn the polpette until brown and crusty all over – about three minutes for each batch – then reduce the heat and continue to cook, again turning from time to time, until the polpette are cooked through, roughly another seven minutes (cut into one to check how they’re doing; there should be no trace of pink).
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Course; Chicken

Chicken with pumpkin, cream and gruyère

Chicken with pumpkin, cream and gruyère

This dish is a duvet, a hug, a totally yielding mixture of soft pumpkin, chicken and melting cheese. And sometimes you need that. It is very rich; small portions are advisable.
Couverts6
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Ingredients

  • 1 kg 2lb 4oz pumpkin or butternut squash (unprepared weight)
  • 3 tbsp olive oil
  • salt and pepper
  • 8 skinless boneless chicken thighs or breasts
  • 400 ml 14fl oz double cream
  • 1 garlic clove crushed
  • 25 g scant 1oz grated Gruyère
  • 25 g scant 1oz grated Parmesan

Instructions

  • Preheat the oven to 200°C/400°F/gas mark 6.
  • Peel and deseed the pumpkin and cut it into wedges.
  • Put the wedges into a roasting tin, brush with olive oil, season and roast in the oven for about 30 minutes, or until completely tender (and even slightly caramelized).
  • Now put the squash into a gratin or other ovenproof dish, one that is big enough to accommodate the chicken too.
  • Meanwhile, cook the chicken.
  • Simply season it all over, heat 1½ tbsp olive oil in a frying pan and sauté the chicken on both sides until golden and cooked through, eight to 10 minutes.
  • Cut each piece into three.
  • Add the chicken to the pumpkin.
  • Heat the cream with the garlic until it’s boiling, take off the heat, season and pour over the chicken and pumpkin.
  • Sprinkle on both cheeses and bake for 20–25 minutes.
  • The dish should be bubbling and golden.
  • Serve.
  • You need something to cut the richness, so a salad of bitter leaves is good.
  • Children like it with pasta, but I prefer brown rice or another nutty whole grain.
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Course; Chicken / Sauce