Nice things to do with chicken

It's been warm, if I haven't mentioned that. But mercifully, the weather is breaking in time for me to clear the freezer (I've another Cley Smokehouse delivery tomorrow, v urgent space requirements). It's been a rather chickeny end to the week, but I reckon these dishes would work well for pretty much any weather apart from broiling, so they are useful for the future. And both super simple; one ideally needs marinading; neither needs a lot of attention otherwise. Enjoy them!

Elderflower chicken thighs

I'm an enthused buyer of elderflower cordial but I don't always find it easy to use up a bottle; it gets a bit samey. So I was intrigued by this recipe in my shiny new German cookery book. It could have been sickly, but as you will see the second major ingredient suggests this isn't some mimsy flowery sauce...

4 tbsps elderflower cordial

4 cloves of garlic

Splash of oil

Seasoning

Roll 4-6 chicken thighs (on the bone) in this, or else do loads of wings. Put into an oven at 200degrees/180 fan and cook for 35-55 minutes depending on if it's wings/thighs and how your oven does. Baste pretty regularly, because you want loads of syrupy/garlicky/salty/brown goodness on the outside. The thighs caramelise very deeply because of the extra 10 minutes or so, but they didn't taste burnt. They did taste delicious. Yes, I had to have the oven on, but it was worth it.

 

 

 

But I invite you to consider as well/instead:

 

Ras el hanout wraps

Ideally, do marinade this - but since it's 1 tbsp ras el hanout and 1 tbsp oil simply mixed and smeared on the meat, it's not too fancy. Do take the time to cut through the thick part of the breast so that you've got more open and thin fillets to cook. 

These are going to be fried (I'm sure you could oven bake them, but this is still yesterday, when No Power On This Earth would have encouraged me to have the oven on.) I gave them maybe 5 minutes one side, 4 minutes the other, on a medium flame. 

 

The ras mix will vary depending on where you get it but mine (from the brilliant Arabica which does stalls in London, nationwide delivery, but also briefly stocked my local M&S but *not any more* woe). Mine has loads of turmeric which looks cheerful when the meat is raw...

 

 

 

And when it's cooked it looks spectacular. 

 

 

This is for wraps, and wants a yoghurt mix with it. This has Greek yoghurt, mint and sumac. Fresh mint in theory but *koff* I used mine earlier in the week so there's dried in here and some parsley for crunch. 

I have giant wraps which weren't ideal, but sliced chicken, yoghurt, maybe some onion, definitely pomegranate molasses. I *may* have forgotten the latter for lunch today, tsk. It definitely adds something (remind me tomorrow, I might even use my Fancy Cherry Molasses). And two chicken breasts do 3-4 meals easy, so it's handy.