Roast Chicken with Sumac and Lemon

My good friend, Luis Calvo Alonso brought me a packet of the exotic sumac spice from Istanbul. I decided to adapt a recipe from Yotam Ottolenghi. I do not have za'atar, which is a blend of spices usually consisting of thyme, sumac, oregano and toasted sesame seed.  I made my own blend with ajwain (a thyme flavored seed), sumac and white sesame seeds instead. The chicken is quartered and seasoned overnight, before it is roasted together with the marinate in a casserole at 200 deg C.  Before serving, it is garnished with roasted pine nuts, parsley and a drizzle of olive oil.

Ingredients
1 large free-range chicken, divied into quarters
2 red onions, thinly sliced
2 garlic cloves, crushed
4 tablespoons olive oil, plus extra for drizzling
1 1/2 teaspoons ground allspice
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 tablespoon sumac
1 lemon, thinly sliced
200ml chicken stock
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon ground black pepper
2 tablespoons za’atar
20g butter
50g pine nuts
4 tablespoons chopped flat leaf parsley

Alitas de Pollo sin Hueso

I saw a boneless chicken wing tapas recipe from "A Day at elBulli" and decided to try it. The chicken wing is seasoned with salt, pepper and ginger and slow cooked in a vacuum bag for 18 hrs at 70 deg C. The book recommended 24 hrs at 60 deg C, which I find impossible to have the bones removed without tearing the wing. One end of the bone is trimmed and then carefully removed. The wing is then pan fried in medium heat till it is well browned.

Here, I make a chicken wing bruschetta. The wing is placed over a bed of grilled bell pepper and foccacia. I add a slice of black garlic to give it a 'sweet meets savory' taste.

Chicken breast with Sage Butter and

This is a lovely dish, quick and simple. The chicken breast is stuffed with sage and mustard butter, then wrapped in hickory smoked bacon, and seared slowly in a cast iron skillet. Sage goes really well with chicken. Deglaze the juices and herb butter that oozes out, and add it to the chicken when serving.

You may take this recipe a level up by replacing the bacon with Italian proscuitto or Spanish jamon iberico.

For the vegetable accompaniment, I spiced it up with ajwain seeds, tumeric and rock salt to give it a distinctive flavour, but not over powering.

Hyderabadi Chicken Biryani

This dish is the result after many failures. It is well worth the effort. I am now very pleased as it is one of the most aromatic biryani I have tasted. I use the Kohinoor basmati rice, which is my favourite. It has excellent texture and is very silky.

Initially, I tried the kachchi approach, where the marinated chicken is covered with half cooked basmati rice and cook on very low and slow heat (dum) until completely done. Even with a thick base steel casserole, it did not help as the meat was burnt at the bottom. The Pakki approach is easier to control as you cook the chicken completely, then layer the half-cooked rice and finish it on slow heat. I decided to try the middle way, where the half-cooked meat is layered with half-cooked rice, and it has worked very well with a cast iron casserole.

I have added or substituted some of the spices from the original Hyderabadi recipe, with those more commonly found in South East Asia. Who says only Indians can cook a good biryani?