Tag Archives: Italian

Venetian Spiced Roast Chicken & Apples

21 Tuesday Jan 2025

Posted by in Main Courses

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

, , , , , , ,

This recipe was inspired by a description of Venice as a historical trading port and how its cuisine has been influence by the goods and people passing through it throughout the ages. Arab traders brought a taste for fruit cooked with meat and Marco Polo introduced eastern spices not just to Venice, but from there into Western Europe. I thought to combine these two influences to spice up a Sunday roast.

For 4 portions

medium sized free range chicken cut into about 12 pieces

1 teaspoon black peppercorns

1/2 teaspoon sea salt

3 garlic cloves

2 cloves

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

good pinch of saffron

zest and juice of half a lemon and half an orange

2 tart eating apples

Using a pestle and mortar grind the salt, peppercorns and cloves together to a powder

Add the ground cinnamon and nutmeg, mix well.

Chop the garlic roughly and add to the spices, crush to a paste, then add the saffron, orange and lemon zest and juice.

Mix well to a paste and add the the chicken portions mixing well to ensure that the chicken is well covered with the marinade.

Leave for an hour to let flavours to enter and tenderise the chicken.

Roast the chicken pieces in a hot oven 180 fan or 200C for twenty minutes.

Cut the apples into wedges and remove the cores.

Take the chicken out of the oven and turn each piece, add the apple pieces and return to the oven for another twenty minutes.

If you want to roast potatoes with the chicken, have them peeled, cut into the size you like and seasoned. Twenty minutes before the chicken needs to go in the oven start roasting the potatoes in olive oil. After the twenty minutes, take the tray out of the oven and turn the potatoes over. Add the chicken and proceed as above

Enjoy!

Endives & Butter Beans

25 Wednesday Dec 2024

Posted by in Vegan, Vegetable Dishes, Vegetarian

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , ,

I see that it’s been far too long since I’ve posted anything, it’s not that I haven’t cooked and it’s not that I haven’t photographed some good recipes and scribbled down how I made them, I’ve just not got to the final typing and posting bit. I’m about to make amends.

The Italians have a way of taking a few, usually seasonal, ingredients and preparing them in a quite simple way to make dishes that are so tasty. This is one of those dishes.
The type of endive it uses is the large frilly one also known as frizze, in Spanish Escarole Rizada. The blanched inner parts are fabulous in salads, while the outer greener leaves can be cooked. They have a slight bitterness so need to be balanced with something soft in flavour like butter beans.

For 2 portions

1 small onion – cut in half and sliced thinly

3 garlic cloves – finely chopped

fresh red chilli – finely chopped

1 tablespoon olive oil

outer leaves of a large endive – washed well and drained

300 grams cooked butter beans – they can be tinned or from a jar.

salt and freshly ground black pepper

In a large frying pan heat the olive oil over a low heat.

Add the onions, garlic and chilli. I haven’t given an amount for the chilli as they vary so much in strength, for this you just want to know it’s there without it being strong, so add the chilli slowly if you are unsure.

Cover and cook slowly until the onions are soft.

Cut the endive into bite sized pieces and add to the pan. You might have to do this in two lots and let the first half of the endive cook down before adding the rest.

Cover and braise for five minutes. Stir and continue braising for another five minutes.

Season well and add the beans, mixing them in to the endive. Let cook a couple of minutes for the flavours to infuse.

Serve and enjoy