Moroccan Inspired Roast Chicken
Moroccan Inspired Roast Chicken - Serves 4
This dish is excellent to eat on for an early summer meal, in the garden with a glass of wine. Its spices & fruit tones are inspired by Middle Eastern and Moroccan flavours.
I fell in love with these flavours way before I moved to Israel, however this was enhanced by so many of my Israeli friends who hailed from a Moroccan or Tunisian background.
This dish is so easy to prepare & cook and is best served with cuscus and a green salad with a garlic and lemon dressing.
Ingredients
1 roasting chicken cut into portions
50 grammes or two oz of fresh root ginger grated.
6-8 garlic cloves chopped.
the juice of 1 lemon
2 bay leaves
2 tablespoons of good quality extra virgin olive oil
six shallots peeled and chopped.
250 grammes or 1/2 pound of dried apricot cut into half.
250 grammes or 1/2 pound mixed green and black grapes
1 cinnamon stick or ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
one teaspoon ground cumin
one teaspoon ground coriander
I tin chickpeas drained
half a teaspoon sea salt
half a teaspoon ground black pepper
500 ml or 1 pint of chicken or vegetable stock
Method
- In a casserole dish place half, the ginger all the garlic half the lemon juice half of olive oil the spices & seasoning mix well and add the chicken make sure that all the chicken is covered in the marinade and leave in the fridge for at least an hour or even overnight.
- Cut and deseed the grapes, put them in a bowl with the chopped shallots, and the dried apricot mix with the remaining ginger, and lemon juice.
- Pre heat your oven to 180C/350F gas mark 4.
- In a heavy bottom frying pan heat half, the olive oil, remove the chicken from the marinade and cook for about 3 minutes on each side until brown. Place the chicken into a casserole dish, add the marinade, the grape and apricot mix, stock & chickpeas.
- Cook for 45- 50 minutes until the chicken is tender and almost falling off the bone without being dry.
Serve on Couscous or rice with the sauce and fruit.