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Coronation chicken and adolescent hens
This was topical a week ago, but I’ve been rather over-stretched. Amongst other things, the horses flooded their barn (our mare enjoys turning on taps with her nose), and one of the hens is in the midst of a phanton pregnancy. Actually our mare’s passion for taps might be a blessing in disguise. The flooding reached the hens’ nest which meant that the phantom nester had to abandon ship (not without much cussing) and go back to being a hen that struts around (with wet feet!), as opposed to a hen that skulks in bed, hissing at anyone that approaches and only getting up once a day for food. This, I assume is the hen equivalent of a ‘fags and booze run’. Thinking about it, maybe she’s just hit adolescence and it’s not a phantom pregnancy at all…This coronation chicken is made with Greek yoghurt as opposed to mayonaise, which makes it a healthier option, without sacrificing any of the creamy taste or texture.
Ingredients (serves four)
4 chicken breasts
1 glass red wine
butter
bay leaves
2 greek yoghurts
2 tablespoons mango chutney
1 shallot
2 cloves garlic
fresh grated ginger
chopped cucumber
seasoning (salt, pepper, curry powder, cumin)
half a cup of sultanas
half a cup of chopped almonds
fresh mint
Poach the chicken breasts in the wine, a little water and melted butter (there should be enough liquid to just cover them), seasoning and bay leaves. Strain and put aside to cool.
Mix the yoghurt, mango chutney, chopped shallots, crushed garlic, grated ginger, seasoning (plenty of curry powder), sultanas, almonds and chopped cucumber and add the cooled poached chicken. Mix well and then chill for at least two hours. Add the fresh mint and serve. -
Navarin of chicken
I know that, strictly speaking, this should be navarin of lamb. I did briefly hover over the lamb counter, but before I’m ever able to pass from hover to purchase so many images of sweet, fluffy new-born lambs dancing in the long spring grass come to mind that I just can’t do it. Mind you, now that we have hens and I see them living their free-range lives, chicken will no doubt be off the menu soon too!
From an idealistic perspective I should probably be a vegetarian, but I remain entrenched in my conviction that we are meant to eat at least a small amount of meat. I’ve also seen too many miserable-looking vegetarians for it to be an attractive proposition; why is it that they so often look grey and dour?
The term ‘navarin’ is really a reference to the vegetable content of the dish and not the meat, so here is my Navarin for Sensitives Souls:
Ingredients (serves 4)
4 chicken wings and 4 legs
4 spring onions
10 baby carrots
4 baby leaks
6 new potatoes
4 baby turnips
1 courgette
cup of peas
olive oil
seasoning (salt, pepper, chicken stock)
bay leaf, rosemary, fresh mint
2 glasses of dry white wine
Slice the onions and gently brown in a casserole dish in the olive oil. Add the chicken pieces and seasoning and brown gently for a couple of minutes. Add the wine, chicken stock and herbs. Bring to a gentle simmer and add the carrots, leaks, turnips and potatoes. Place in a preheated oven (180°C) for an hour and then add the peas and sliced courgettes, making sure that the liquid level in the dish is still at least 3cms. Cook for a further 20 minutes and add the fresh chopped mint just before serving. -
Cod with basil and tomatoes
A lady fishmonger served me this morning and, instead of enquiring into the corpulence of the people I was going to cook for, took the time to explain this delicious recipe to me. There was a massive queue, but she certainly didn’t let this deter her from such minutiae as the exact size to cut the basil leaves and a description of the delectable aroma that would waft from the oven after about five minutes’ cooking. She even took the time to wish me a ‘bon appétit’ before turning to her line of, by this time, fuming but drooling clients. It’s a terrible cliché, I know, but I do maintain that one of the things I love most about the French is that they have their priorities well and truly in order.
Ingredients (serves four)
4 cod filets
12 cherry tomatoes
1 tbsp mustard
Olive oil
10 basil leaves
handfull of pinenuts
1 cup of wholemeal breadcrumbs
1 clove of garlic
sea salt and pepper
Preheat the oven to 200°C. Cover the cod filets with olive oil and place in an ovenproof dish. Season and then brush the filets with mustard before tossing them in the breadcrumbs and sliced basil leaves. Cover the tomatoes (cut in two) with breadcrumbs and then add to the dish. Sprinkle the chopped garlic and pinenuts over everything and cook for 15 minutes.
Bon appétit! -
Cod in chickpea batter (gf)
Cod in chickpea batter When I asked for cod filet for three this morning, the fishmonger asked if it was for three normal people, or three rugbymen. I had replied that it was for three normal people and then wondered if this wasn’t perhaps stretching the truth a bit.
In southwestern France, we live amongst constant reminders of the rugby-playing heritage. Many refer to the region as l’Ovalie, which means the land of the oval ball, and one Landaise priest has even dedicated his chapel, Notre Dame du Rugby, to his passion! Towns and villages are deserted whenever there’s a match on, and weekends in hospital emergency rooms are not for the faint-hearted; they’re bursting with sights of broken and bloody noses, limbs and assorted extremities and sounds of blubbering girlfriends.
Back to my normal fish. Delicious as it is, cod can be a bit bland. Although that could be due to my overextended tastebuds which are singed on a regular basis by very spicy food. This chickpea batter is both healthy and delicious and an excellent vehicle for herbs and spices. Chickpea flour is far healthier than refined wheat flour as it’s packed with vitamins (particularly folic acid), minerals and protein-building amino acids. It also has a very low GI and is very tasty.
Recipe for cod in chickpea batter (for 4 normal people)- 4 cod filets
- 50g chickpea flour
- 1 cup of water
- 1 garlic clove
- olive oil and coconut oil
- seasoning (salt pepper, paprika)
- pinch of bicarbonate of soda
Combine the chickpea flour and bicarbonate of soda with enough water (roughly a cup) to make a batter similar to a pancake batter. Add the seasoning and crushed garlic clove, then dip the cod filets in the batter, making sure they are covered all over. Cook in about half a centimetre of olive and coconut oils on a medium hob (cooking oil should never smoke) for about five minutes on each side. The end result should be golden brown and crisp!
Cod in chickpea batter -
Tunisian meatloaf
Although I never let slip a chance to take a cheap pop at vegetarians (our horses, for example – how could anyone in their right mind just eat grass all day?), I’m not exactly a flesh-ripping carnivore myself. In fact, the better meat is disguised, the happier I am.
It’s complicated serving meat in this house. My husband and son, in true French male style, get inconsolably hysterical if they think it’s overcooked and I ‘come over queer’ if it’s underdone. Hugo, the labrador, is extremely conciliatory (or greedy?) and eats it either way.
This fragrent meatloaf ticks all the boxes; vegetables for me so that I forget I’m eating meat, and just enough meat for my carnivourous husband and son to satisfy their Neanderthal instincts.
Ingredients (serves six to eight)
2 onions
3 carrots
1 aubergine
2 garlic cloves
3 medium tomatoes
Olive oil
200g pre-cooked chickpeas
300g minced beef or lamb
3 eggs
1 tbsp Lee and Perrins sauce
Parsley
Rosemary
Bay leaf
50ml tomato ketchup
seasoning to taste (seasalt, pepper, cumin, coriander, cayenne pepper)
Cut the aubergine into slices and leave to ‘sweat’ out the moisture with seasalt. Brown the vegetables (including the aubergine) in olive oil in a large frying pan cooking over a medium heat for about 20 minutes. Add the rosemary and seasoning and set aside. Combine the meat, beaten eggs, Lee and Perrins sauce and ketchup in another bowl. Roughly blend the vegetable mixture, chickpeas and fresh parsely until it forms a lumpy paste (ie not blended too much) and add it to the meat mixture. Spoon the combined mixture into a loaf tin and cook for about an hour and a half in a medium oven (180°C). Leave to sit for ten minutes before slicing.
May be served hot with couscous cooked with mint, sultanas and peas and a hot tomato sauce, or cold with crisp green salad and gherkins.
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Basque Chicken
Our multi-talented Spanish carpenter, who my husband disparagingly refers to as the ‘poet’ (as in Real Men Don’t Do Poetry), gave us several jars of his home-made spicy tomato sauce, which my son then referred to as ‘ketchup in a jar’. Between them, husband and son make quite sure that neither carpenter nor tomato sauce get too up themselves.
Poulet Basquaise should really be made with Espelette pepper, which is a cross between paprika and chilli pepper, and is a speciality of the village of Espelette in the Basque country.
Ingredients (serves 4)
4 chicken thighs and 4 legs
1 tin of peeled tomatoes (or homemade if possible)
1 tin of white beans
4 cloves of garlic
1 onion
5 mushrooms, sliced
1 bell pepper
1 cup of black olives
olive oil
sprig of rosemary
1 glass of white wine
seasoning to taste (salt, pepper, paprika, chilli powder or if possible Espelette pepper)
Chop the onions, garlic and mushrooms and add to the olive oil in an oven-proof casserole dish. Cook until golden and then add the chicken pieces, which should also be cooked until golden-brown on both sides. Add the wine, herbs and seasoning and cook for about 2 minutes so that the chicken can absorb the wine. Add the tomatoes and heat until simmering. Lastly add the beans and olives and cook in a medium oven (150°C) until the tomatoes begin to caramalise (just under two hours).
Poulet Basquaise is usually served with sauté potatoes or rice, although I often serve it with polenta and a crisp green salad. -
Salmon and quinoa
It actually stopped raining for the first time in over three weeks this morning and I was able to walk the (by now totally manic) dog without coming back absolutely soaked to the core. I even caught a glimpse of a rather strange, bright yellow ball of fire in the sky – I wonder what that could have been?
My meteorological ponderings and canine therapy took longer than expected, so I wanted to do something quick for lunch. And this is it. If you use frozen salmon, make sure it’s thoroughly defrosted before you cook it; cooking from frozen causing a thermal shock which tends to make the fish (or meat) tougher. Obviously it’s best if you can get fresh salmon (and preferably Scottish 😉
Ingredients (serves 4)
4 salmon filets
2 spring onions (or shallots)
olive oil
Lee and Perrins or soya sauce
seasoning (salt, pepper, chilli flakes)
1 tsp brown sugar
1 cup of quinoa
1 cup of peas
handful of fresh basil
chopped tomato
chopped garlic
Put the salmon filets in an ovenproof dish, coating fairly generously with olive oil on either side. Rock salt and pepper to taste and then I added some chilli peppers (not for the children though), spring onions and dried seaweed (OK for the children as long as you don’t actually utter the word ‘seaweed’). Also a dash of Lee and Perrins. This should be cooked in a very very hot oven for 12 minutes. I know this sounds OCD, but it really must be 12 minutes; 11 too few, 13 too many!
Use organic quinoa if possible cooked with a handful of peas. Don’t overcook or it will become a slimy mess (losing many valuable nutrients along the way). Once cooked, run under cold water or it will continue to cook, drain thoroughly and then mix with chopped garlic, fresh basil (ripped into small pieces,) and nice juicy chopped tomatoes. Season with rock salt, pepper, balsamic vinegar and olive oil.
I also served it with a few white aspargus, of which we have an absolute glut at the moment (life can be very hard).
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Chicken in the pot
This dish is traditional Sunday fare in Aquitaine. It was made popular by Henri IV who declared his hope to be that France would become peaceful and prosperous enough for every family to be able to enjoy ‘poule au pot’ every Sunday. This is obviously my ‘take’ on the dish; I don’t think that French families had access to Lee and Perrins sauce in Henri IV’s day.
Today is election day. Here’s to hoping that our next president will bear Henri’s good intentions for peace and prosperity in mind…
Ingredients (serves 6)
1 chicken
1 onion
1 leek
3 cloves of garlic
3 medium carrots
1 cup of peas
5 mushrooms (sliced)
1 courgette
rosemary, bayleaf
olive oil
glass of white wine
Lee and Perrins sauce
2 tablespoons of redcurrant jelly
seasoning to taste (sea salt, pepper and paprika)
Lightly brown the onion, garlic and mushrooms in the olive oil in a casserole dish. Add the chicken and brown on both sides. Add a good slug of Lee and Perrins and the redcurrant jelly and continue heating. Add the sliced carrots, rosemary and bayleaf and turn chicken right-side-up. Season generously and add the glass of white wine. If you don’t have any wine open, you can use apple juice for a sweeter taste, or just water with a tiny bit of chicken stock.
Put the lid on the casserole and cook in a medium oven (150°C) for about an hour and a half. You should check half way through that there is still some liquid left in the bottom of the casserole (a couple of centimetres is ideal). If there is too much liquid you could take the lid off for the last 15 minutes. The peas and sliced courgettes should be added about 20 minutes before serving so that they stay firm.
This is lovely served with mashed potato any green vegetable. -
Duck breast
This is a typical Gascon dish, and one that we enjoy quite frequently. In the winter it’s lovely served with potatoes fried in duck fat and green beans. In the summer it’s delicious finely sliced and served lukewarm on a green salad with orange slices and mint. It should not be overcooked – the meat should be pink. The aim of a good magret de canard is a crisp skin on the outside and liberation of all the fat between the skin and the meat (which is why the fat should be drained off several times).
Everyone benefits from this dish; we eat the meat and the dog eats the fat, which is often slung across the table at him (not by me I hasten to add). Not that he actually sits at the table with us, obviously. It’s funny though how his ‘catch on the fly’ reflexes are spot-on when it comes to catching airborne duck fat, far more so than for catching common or garden morsels.
One last thing. Please remember if asking for this in a restaurant in France that it is ‘magret de canard’ and not, as a friend of my once ordered, ‘magret de connard’; the former is duck breast, the latter roughly translated means ‘breast of arsehole’…
Ingredients (serves 4)
2 duck breasts
rock salt, pepper
1 tablespoon of honey
star anise
Preheat the oven to very hot (220°C). Score the duck breasts on the fatty side using a very sharp knife, cutting in a parallel lines. Generously Season both sides of each breast with the rock salt and pepper and then the honey. Put the two breasts together, fat side out. Bind with colourless string. Cook for 15 minutes on one side, remove from oven and drain the fat. Then 15 minutes on the other side, remove and drain. Put back for another 15 minutes or until the skin is golden brown.
Slice into slices of just under a centimetre and serve. -
Ways with asparagus
Asparagus season started here in early April and is set to continue until the end of May. White asparagus is more common in France and I buy ours direct from the farm up the road. They’re so fresh and tender that I don’t even need to cut the ends off.
Asparagus can be roasted with olive oil and rock salt for about 15/20 minutes, steamed, cooked in simmering water (15 minutes) or even microwaved (although I wouldn’t personally recommend this and I hate microwaves and ours ‘mysteriously’ died an undignified death at the rubbish dump).
One of the classic ways to eat asparagus is with a Hollandaise sauce (very topical at the moment!), which is quite tricky to make but very rewarding if you succeed (good luck!)
Asparagus can be grilled with parma ham (or probably Bayonne ham if you live here!) and parmesan, which is a delicious combination. A great favourite in this area is asparagus omelette, which is a mouth-watering combination of corn-fed chicken eggs, butter and tender aspargus tips. Be sure not to overcook the omelette – the inside should still be slightly runny.
Another traditional way to serve them here is ‘au gratin’. Make a well-seasoned béchamel sauce and then fold in the asparagus and if you like, some ham. Cover the top with grated cheese and a dot of butter. Bake in a hot oven (200°C) until the top is crispy and golden.
