Chicken in dried mushroom and tomato sauce

adapted from Marcella Hazan

25g dried italian or french mushrooms

4 chicken thighs, skinned

8 tablespoons dry cider or dry white wine

1/2 tin chopped tomatoes

butter or oil

Place the dried mushrooms in 150mls lukewarm water. Allow to soak for 15-20 minutes. Line a sieve with a piece of kitchen paper. Filter the water in which the mushrooms have soaked into another container. Rinse the soaked mushrooms, making sure to remove any grit, then chop into small pieces.

Heat oil or butter in frying pan. Brown the chicken pieces on both sides. Add the cider and turn up heat to evaporate. Then add the chopped mushrooms, the soaking water, chopped tomatoes and salt and pepper. Cover the pan and cook gently for about 30-40 minutes, until chicken is tender.

This is another quick and easy dish. The dried mushrooms, cider and tomatoes give it a lovely rich flavour. We eat it with plainly cooked Basmati rice.

Yoghourt marinated spiced chicken

This makes a mildly spicy, creamy, tomatoey dish. I didn't use a recipe, but was thinking of chicken korma.

Marinade:

3 cloves garlic, crushed

2" knob fresh ginger, peeled and crushed

1 sliced onion

plain yoghourt, enough to cover chicken pieces

Other Ingredients

4 free range chicken thighs, skin removed

garam masala, 10mls

turmeric, 5mls

ground dried coriander, 10mls

ground cumin, 5mls

paprika, 5mls

salt and pepper

6 cardamon pods

1tin chopped tomatoes

200mls double cream

chopped coriander leaves

Put the chicken and marinade into a china bowl. Mix around well, and leave to marinade at least 6 hours. You can prepare it in the morning, or the night before.

When you are ready to cook, take the chicken out of the marinade, removing any bits of onion. Pat the pieces dry on a piece of kitchen towel. Put all the ground spices onto a large plate, mixing them together. Pat each side of the chicken pieces in the spice mixture. Meanwhile heat some vegetable oil in a frying pan. When just smoking, put the chicken pieces in and brown lightly on each side. Take the chicken out of the pan. Reduce the heat and add the cardamon pods. After a couple of minutes add the yoghourt and onion marinade. Cook gently for about 15 minutes until onion softened. Then put the chicken back into the pan, add the tomatoes and a little water. Bring to a simmer, reduce heat, cover and cook gently for about 35-40 minutes. 5 minutes before end of cooking add the cream and let it bubble into a delicious sauce. Just before serving add chopped coriander leaves.

Serve with rice and green peas.

Courgette risotto

from a recipe by Sophie Grigson

1 onion, chopped

2 nine inch courgettes, one grated, one cut into small pieces

1 cup arborio rice

1 clove garlic, chopped

white wine or dry cider

chicken stock (cube is fine)

grated parmesan

Soften chopped onion in a little olive oil. Tip in the grated courgette and the chopped garlic and cook for a few minutes. Brown the chopped courgette separately in olive oil and reserve. Stir in the rice then add 2-3 tablespoons wine or cider and let evaporate. Add the hot stock, top up at intervals until rice almost cooked. Stir in the cooked chopped courgette and warm through. When rice is ready stir in parmesan to taste.

With this we ate:

Chicken thighs roasted with lemon juice and black pepper

Brown the thighs in butter. Put in a small roasting pan pour over the juice of a lemon and some salt and black pepper. Cook at 180 C for about 35 minutes. The skin was very crisp and brown.

and:

Tomato and spring onion salad

Halved golden cherry tomatoes,mixed with chopped spring onions and a little sugar.

Marinated grilled chicken, Dry cauliflower curry

The chicken had been marinating for 48 hours. It's been years since I made this. I always find it quite difficult to grill chicken. The result is usually very well cooked areas, with some undercooked bits. I seem to remember better results cooking it in the oven then putting under the grill for a few minutes. However, the vinegar in the marinade had tenderised it nicely. The cauliflower curry went well with the chicken. it tasted especially nice when mixed with the basmati rice.

Marinated chicken

 from An invitation to Indian Cooking, by Madhur Jaffrey

Half of a whole chicken, cut into pieces (about 800g)

Marinade

2 medium size onions peeled and coarsely chopped    fresh chili to taste, seeded

4 cloves garlic peeled and chopped                                 1tsp ground cumin

1" piece fresh ginger peeled and chopped                      1tbsp ground coriander

1/4 pint wine vinegar                                                         2tbsp oil

salt and pepper

Grind all ingredients in an electric blender. I use a small Revel blender which reduces the ingredients to slush very efficiently.

Take skin off chicken pieces, prick with a fork and mix with the marinade in a pottery bowl. Cover and refrigerate for 4-48 hours.

Preheat oven to 180C. Take chicken out of marinade and  cook on wire rack about 45 minutes. Brown under grill. Baste with extra marinade while cooking if necessary.

Cauliflower curry

 from Indian Cooking by Lalita Ahmed

1 medium cauliflower cut into florets                        2.5ml ground turmeric

1 medium onion chopped 10mls ground coriander

10mls cumin seeds          juice of 1 lemon

2 medium potatoes peeled and cut in chunks

2.5mls chili powder

plain yoghourt

Heat 2 tbsp oil in frying pan. Fry onion until light brown. Then add cumin seeds for a minute or two until they start making a popping noise. Add the potato pieces and cook for 4-5 minutes, then stir in cauliflower and cook for another few minutes. Add all the spices and lemon juice. Cover and cook gently for another 10 -15 minutes. Stir in plain yoghurt at the end.

Chicken thighs baked on a celeriac, carrot and onion base

An experiment. I had a large celeriac in the fridge and wondered how I could use this with the chicken. So:

4 chicken thighs

1/4 celeriac, peeled and cut into chunks about 1"x2"

1 large carrot, peeled

1 large onion, peeled and cut into chunks

balsamic vinegar, 1 tbsp

honey, 1 tbsp

white wine vinegar, 1 tbsp

vegetable oil 1tbsp

I put all the veg in a rectangular pottery dish and mixed in the honey, balsamic vinegar, white wine vinegar, oil, and salt and pepper. Once I flattened the vegetable layer, I put the lightly oiled chicken pieces on top, skin side up. Then I put the dish in the oven at 180C for 40 minutes. The chicken was nicely cooked and browned. However, the veg were still too crunchy. I took the chicken off the top and kept it warm. I covered the dish with cling film and put it on high in the microwave for 10 minutes. If I did this again, I would parboil the veg for 10 minutes, before putting them in the dish and proceeding as before. The result was a slightly tangy and sweet flavoured vegetable.