Thankfully, now we have
moved. Now we have a slightly dark, small kitchen, but it has a GAS
HOB, a door I can close to have my own space, and a radio with 6music
constantly on. It's bloody brilliant. I have already spent lots of
time in there pottering away, while Joe has the other room to himself
to watch films/play his playstation and we're both happy. Sad isn't
it?
So, on to the food. We
had some friends round last night for some eating, drinking, and
catching up. I wanted to make something that wouldn't be too much
faff, wouldn't have me stuck in the kitchen while they were here and
was a little bit different. So I decided to make up a recipe for
Moroccan chicken, and make some houmous and baba ganoush to go with
it. It was a success – I'd bought about four extra pieces of
chicken thinking it might be nice in a sandwich the next day and it
was all eaten.
I apologise for the
terrible photos. Frankly, I'd been drinking.
As usual, I'm not one
for writing up other peoples recipes, so here are a couple of links
for the houmous and baba ganoush recipes I used. I made these in the
morning before my friends arrived.
http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/2029/homemade-houmous
– I'd use slightly less tahini than this recipe suggests
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2013/sep/25/how-to-make-perfect-baba-ganoush
(by the way, this column is brilliant, you should read it)
Making baba ganoush also means I got to do this: (which is fun)
Moroccan-ish Chicken:
(serves four very
hungry/greedy people)
Ingredients:
12 chicken drumsticks
and thighs, ideally on the bone and with skin, but
we had a bit of a
mixture
1 x preserved lemon (or
two, if they're little)
2 big tablespoons
harissa
2 tablespoons honey
2 cloves of garlic,
crushed
a good slug of olive
oil
teaspoon of cumin
salt and pepper
- To prepare the
preserved lemon, scoop out the flesh from inside into a big bowl (big
enough for all your chicken). Slice the rind and add that too.
- Mix everything else
except the chicken together, adding enough oil to make sure it's not
too thick – it should be the consistency of double cream
- Put the chicken in
and mix well. Cover it in cling film and leave it in the fridge for a
few hours.
- When you're ready to
cook, preheat your oven to 180 degrees, and lay the chicken pieces
out in one layer. I needed two trays. Pour over any remaining
marinade. Cook for 30 – 40 minutes until the skin has blackened a
bit and it's cooked through.
For something So easy,
this was really tasty. Definitely worth doing. I think the marinade would probably work really well with a whole roast chicken too.
I served it with a load
of olives, some steamed green beans, cous cous mixed with pomegranate
seeds, and toasted pitta breads.
We then had brownies
with raspberries and ice cream, so here's a picture of that too:
