Easy Chicken

Ingredients

1 whole free-range or corn fed chicken, broken down into 8 pieces

(or 8 of your favorite chicken pieces, skin on and bone- in preferable)

2 tbsp soy sauce

1 tbsp light brown sugar

2 tbsp red wine vinegar

3 tbsp olive oil

4 shallots, chopped

2 cloves of garlic, minced

Handful of fresh parsley

Salt and Pepper

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 425 (220)

2. In a large baking dish, combine marinade and toss with chicken. Season well.

3. Place chicken pieces skin side up and roast for 30 minutes until it begins to brown. Remove and baste with marinade. Flip pieces and bake a remaining 10 minutes or until chicken is cooked.

4. Garnish with lots of fresh parsley

Read more at http://myfridgefood.com/ViewRecipe.aspx?recipe=21222#F3jHyF8jcmBmhoGB.99

Chicken Saute with Tomato (Domatesli Tavuk Sote)

1 chicken breast, cut in cubes
2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
3-4 garlic cloves, sliced
1 cubanelle pepper, cut in small pieces
2 green onions, chopped
2 tomato, cut in cubes
2 tbsp crushed tomato, in can
1 tbsp red pepper paste
1 pinch crushed red pepper (optional)
1/2 tsp oregano
Salt
Pepper

In a medium sized pan, saute the chicken and garlic with olive oil until the garlic cloves lose their smell. Add all the remaining ingredients. Simmer for about 15-20 minutes with the lid covered. If necessary, add a little bit hot water.

Turkish Chicken Pilau

Serves 4 Cook 30 mins


Ingredients
small handful pine nuts or flaked almonds
1 tbsp olive oil
1 large onion, halved and sliced
2 cinnamon sticks, broken in half
500g chicken breast, cubed
250g basmati rice
1 chichen or vegetable stock cube
12 ready­to­eat dried apricots, or currents/raisins
handful fresh mint leaves, roughly chopped
500 ml boiling water

1. Dry­ fry the pine nuts or almonds in a large pan until lightly toasted, then tip onto a plate. Add the oil to the pan, then fry the onion and cinnamon together until starting to turn golden. Turn up the heat, stir in the chicken, fry until the meat changes colour, then tip in the rice and cook for 1 min, stirring all the time.
2. Pour in 500ml boiling water, crumble in the stock cube, add the apricots, then season to taste. Turn the heat down, cover and simmer for 12 mins until the rice is tender and the stock has been absorbed. Toss in the pine nuts and mint and serve.

Lemon Chicken

Lemon Chicken

Ingredients

• 3 juicy lemons
• 50g butter
• 3 tbsp clear honey
• leaves from 4 rosemary sprigs
• 1 garlic clove , finely chopped
• 8 chicken pieces, such as thighs and drumsticks, with skin
• 750g potatoes , peeled and cut into smallish chunks (You could also serve with rice!)

Serves 4
Easily doubled

Preparation and cooking times

Prep 5 - 10 mins
Cook 1 hr

1. Preheat the oven to 200C/Gas 6/fan180C. Squeeze the juice from 2 lemons into a small pan and heat with the butter, honey, rosemary, garlic and salt and pepper, until the butter melts and it smells fragrant.
2. Lay the chicken in a roasting tin - don't pile it up or it won't cook so well. Add the potatoes and drizzle with lemon butter to coat evenly. Cut the third lemon into 8 wedges and tuck them in. (Can be made up to 2 hours ahead up to this point.)
3. Roast for 50 minutes - 1 hour until the chicken is cooked and the potatoes are crisp and golden. Serve with a green salad.

A recipe for left-over chicken

Chicken Julienne

Ingredients

serves 4

175 g (6 oz) long grain rice
3 Tbsp (40 g) butter
3/8 cup (40 g) plain flour, sieved
1 1/4 cup (300 ml) 1/2 pint chicken stock
1 1/4 cup (1/2 pint) 300 ml milk
350 g (12 oz) cooked chicken, cut into long narrow strips
2 tbsp (30 ml) lemon juice
4 oz (100 g) green beans, cooked
pinch of dried thyme
salt and freshly ground pepper
1 tbsp (15 ml) chopped fresh parsley
4 oz (100 g) carrot, peeled, cut into julienne strips and blanched
1/4 cup (25 g) 1 oz flaked almonds, toasted

Method

1. Cook the rice in a saucepan of boiling salted water until tender, but not soft. Set aside and keep hot.

2. Melt the butter in a pan, stir in the flour and cook gently for 1 minute, stirring. Remove pan from the heat and gradually stir in the stock and milk. Bring to the boil and continue to cook, stirring until the sauce thickens.

3. Gently stir in the chicken, lemon juice, green beans, thyme and seasoning and cook for 5 - 10 minutes until heated through.

4. Add the parsley to the cooked rice and toss lightly. Make a border of rice on a serving dish and spoon the chicken into the centre. Decorate with carrot and almonds.

A simple chicken dinner

I bought some chicken thighs from my butcher last weekend because I thought that I might make the lemon chicken again. They are quite inexpensive and I think, taste better. Here is what I did. It tasted very good so I thought that I should write it down.

Ingredients

1 or 2 small onions (or one large)
6 chicken thighs (2 or 3 people - add thighs accordingly)
1 lemon
1/2 C (4 oz) of dry white wine (not necessary but I had some left from another recipe - I buy 1/2 bottles for cooking)
1 or 2 chicken stock cubes and 1 cup of water (or chicken stock)
salt, pepper, Italian seasonings (whatever you enjoy most)
olive oil (or other)

1. Chop onion/s and gently fry them till they are soft. Don't allow to brown.
2. Remove chicken skins, dust thighs with seasoned flour and brown in frying pan with onions.
3. Once the chicken has been fried on each side, add the wine, and chicken stock (water + stock cubes).
4. Season and add lemon juice.
5. Turn down heat and gently simmer for 45 minutes to an hour.
6. You could add cream or crème fraiche to make a richer sauce.

I served this with mashed potatoes and carrots but you could have rice and any other vegetables.

If you wanted to serve 4 people, you would need 8 good sized thighs.

Sticky Lemon chicken

I had two chicken breasts on the bone and thought that I would make a casserole of some sort. However, when I got home I realized that I had forgotten an essential ingredient. So what to do now! I decided to do something with chicken and lemons since I had two bags of lemons (on special at the supermarket). I couldn't be bothered searching through my cookbooks and tried the internet instead where I discovered this recipe and a short video to show you how to do it. Mine didn't turn out all that sticky but the gravy was wonderful.

1 large chicken jointed into 8-10 pieces (I used two chicken breasts, you could probably use legs and thighs as well)
sea salt and black pepper
3-4 tbsp olive oil
1 head of garlic halved horizontally (you could use less!!!!)
few thyme sprigs
splash of sherry vinegar (I didn't have any but that was fine)
2 tbsp dark soy sauce
3 tbsp honey
1 lemon, finely sliced
bunch of parsley, chopped (I also didn't have any)

Here is the video link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mARkUax2jg0

Sweet and Sour Chicken

400g Chicken (or pork)

12g Sugar

50 ml Soy Sauce

50g Cornflour

1 Clove of garlic - crushed

25g Fresh ginger

1 Onion chopped

1 Pepper, green or red

1 Chilli - chopped

2 Pineapple rings - cut into chunks

100 ml White vinegar

150g Brown Sugar

125 ml Tomato ketchup

1 Tbls Worcester sauce

Cut the meat into chunks and marinade in soy sauce and sugar for 30mins. Meanwhile, prepare the vegetable. Then, boil the vinegar and brown sugar in a sauce pan.

Add the ketchup and Worcester sauce. Leave to simmer.

Take a wok and add enough oil to coat the bottom and heat. Add the chopper garlic and ginger and stir fry for 1 minute. Add the onion, pepper and chilli and stir fry for 3-4 minutes. Stir in the sweet and sour sauce and allow to simmer. Add the pineapple chunks and cook on a low heat. Pass the chicken through the cornflour and deep fry until cooked. Drain and add to the sauce and cook for a further 3-4 minutes. Serve with rice.

I don't deep fry the chicken I just add it to the sauce to cook. It's a good idea to coat it in some corn flour though as this thickens the sauce. I don't add chillis either but sometimes put in thinly sliced carrot. You can also play with the amout of sugar and vinegar you put in to get in sweeter or more sour depending on your taste. It tastes so close to the Sweet and Sour Chicken from the Take Away and is probably better for you! Granted, this is not one for the diabetics amongst us!