Saturday 1 May 2010

Moroccan Chicken Tagine



Ingredients: (Serves 2)
1 tablespoon Ras el hanout (you can buy this, but it's best to make your own. There isn't one definitive list even in Morocco, for this recipe I used a mix of 12 cardamom pods (seeds only), 5 cloves, 1 cinnamon stick, 1 teaspoon red chili flakes, 1 teaspoon coriander seeds, 1 teaspoon cumin seeds, 1/2 nutmeg (grated), 10 black peppercorns, 2 bay leaves and 1 teaspoon of turmeric. Dry fry the seeds, cloves, peppercorns, cinnamon stick and bay leaves, then grind in a pestle and mortar. Add the other ingredients and mix together.
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cumin
4 garlic cloves, finely chopped to a paste
Pinch of sea salt
300g free range chicken, (best to use thighs, but any cut will do - I've used chicken breast, because it's all I had at the time)
1 onion, chopped
1 large fennel bulb, sliced
150g mushrooms, sliced
15 green olives, stoned
500ml chicken stock
1 tablespoon olive oil
1/2 lemon, cut into quarters

Ideally you want to marinade the chicken pieces overnight or for about 2 hours in the ras el hanout, ground ginger and ground cumin but if you don't have time just mix together before starting. Brown the marinated chicken pieces in a large heavy based pan (or tagine) with the olive oil over a hot heat. Turn the heat down and add the onion, garlic and fennel pieces and fry for another few minutes. Add the chicken stock and salt then bring to the boil and reduce the heat to a gentle simmer, cover the pan and leave for an hour.

After an hour, put the olives, mushrooms and lemon quarters into the pan and stir. Put the lid back on and simmer for another half an hour.

If there is still too much liquid in the pan, remove the lid and turn up the heat to reduce. Remove the lemon quarters before serving with steamed greens.

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