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I have this thing when I’m planning meals for the week to make sure that I’m always trying something new. I always make sure every week I make one new recipe I’ve bookmarked from a blog, one from a cookbook and one from a food magazine. Needless to say this means we try a lot of new dishes at home. This also means that a dish really has to wow to make it into my regular rotation.
Today I want to share with you my version (cookbooks so rarely write recipes just to serve two – I was even asked by my publishers to scale up a lot of the recipes in One Pan Pescatarian#ad – so so many of the recipes I find in cookbooks turn into my own adaptions) of a delicious sweet, autumnal, honey-flavoured chicken dish from Emma Spitzer’s brilliant Jewish cookbook Fress: Bold Flavours From A Jewish Kitchen (ad). It comes via Emma’s friend Michal in Israel, and it is so representative of the dishes in the book – bright, vibrant, full of traditional Jewish flavours but put together in a way that is though roughly modern and fresh – something that I growing up with my mothers cookbook collection – always look for in books on Jewish food. Think more Leah Koenig than Claudia Roden (though her Book of Jewish Food (ad) will always and should always hold food bible status!)
So this chicken. It is really simple to make in the oven in a lidded shallow casserole. Toss all the ingredients together, cook for 25 minutes with the lid on, followed by 25 minutes with the lid off. Serve with couscous and some nice fresh parsley. It really could not be easier.
A delicious, autumnal, spiced one pan chicken and sweet potato dish adapted from Emma Spitzer’s book Fress: Bold Flavours From A Jewish Kitchen.
Ingredients
Scale
For the Chicken
4 skin on bone in chicken thighs
1 large sweet potato
4 banana shallots
4 large dates
1 bay leaf
2 sprigs thyme
1 cinnamon stick, crushed
freshly ground sea salt and black pepper
couscous, to serve
roughly chopped flat leaf parsley, to serve
For the Sauce
100ml (1/3 cup) red wine
2 tbsp runny honey
2 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
1/2 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp ground coriander
1 large garlic clove, crushed
1 small nub fresh ginger, grated
Instructions
Pre-heat the oven to 180 degrees (355 fahrenheit). Nestle the chicken thighs, sweet potato, cut into fingers, shallots, peeled and halved, and the dates, halved and pitted in a shallow lidded casserole dish. Nestle the bay leaf, thyme sprigs and the crushed cinnamon stick among the chicken pieces.
Whisk together all the sauce ingredients and pour it over the chicken. Season everything well with salt and pepper.
Clap on the lid and cook the chicken for 25 minutes. Remove the lid and cook for a further 25 minutes. Serve with the couscous, sprinkled with fresh parsley.
I'm a food writer, professional recipe developer and cookbook author living in the English Countryside. I love creating easy, accessable recipes filled with vibrant world flavours that are manageable on busy weeknights. Simple and delicious dinners, from my kitchen to yours!
My newsletter, ingredient, takes a deep dive into a different ingredient - unusual, basic or seasonal - every month delivering stories, histories and most importantly recipes right into your inbox. It's your new favourite food magazine column, but in email form!
My Book
One Pan Pescatarian: 100 Delicious Dinners – Veggie, Vegan, Fish
My second cookbook contains 100 delicious dinner recipes, all of which are either vegetarian, vegan or which celebrate fish and seafood - all cooked in either one pot or one pan.*
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