July 3, 2015
Monthly Mystery Munchies #3: Spiced Chicken with Thyme, Saffron and Lemon Gravy
Our Monthly Mystery Munchies challenge has just gotten better! Gen over at Eat, Play, Clove has chosen 3 key ingredients for this month’s installment to be used in our respective dish: Lemon/Lime (or the juice of), Coriander and Thyme. Also with other ingredients if I like.
This is good as I absolutely lurrrve using a combination of spices and herbs as they make the taste that much more flavourful to a dish. I thought that this is quite up my alley!
Saffron is just one of those ingredients I always keep in my spice cabinet and I usually only use it for festive dishes. But I needed an excuse to use saffron along with the ingredients which Gen suggested, and as I scoured for recipes, I found 2 dishes using saffron: one from Karen Martini and the other from Ethnic Spoon.
One is Syrian, the other is Moroccan…but I don’t have a tagine to work with, although the Moroccan Saffron Chicken looks so amazing. Those are certainly recipes to try for the next time, but this one today has been adapted from Karen Martini’s which has inspired me to create my Grubbecipes for this month’s challenge.
Let me present you with my version of Syrian-Moroccan inspired Spiced Chicken dish that has the 3 vital ingredients required for this challenge with add-ons of saffron, cumin and cranberries:
The flavours blend well and the spice infusion was lovely! There’s a distinct saffron taste with lemony zing while sweetness of the cranberry added a touch of a pleasant surprise to the dish and we love it! This is a definite keeper.
- 2 onions, sliced
- 3 tspn ground cumin
- 2-3 tspn black pepper
- 2 tbsp tumeric powder
- half a tspn of salt
- 8-12 pieces of chicken, with bones and skin
- 2-3 tbsp olive oil
- 3 inches young ginger, thinly sliced
- 1.5 tspn coriander powder
- 5 garlic, pressed
- 4 fresh red chillies, sliced lengthwise
- 3 red tomatoes, chopped
- 2 pinches of saffron thread (saffron can be overpowering, so be mindful with the pinches)
- 1 tspn cumin seeds, lightly pounded
- Sprigs of thyme, leaves only
- 1 lemon, squeeze juice and grate about 2-3 tbsp of zest
- 3-4 tbsp dried cranberries
- 3 tbsp honey
- 1 chicken stock cube
- Onion flakes (optional)
- Bunch of coriander leaves to garnish
- Mix ground cumin, black pepper, tumeric powder and salt together. Rub the mixture to the chicken and set aside.
- Fry chicken in a deep pan with hot oil. I prefer the skin to get a little crispy, but you can also just brown the sides and then remove it from the oil.
- In a separate pan, heat up olive oil. When it is hot enough, press garlic and stir fry for about a minute. Be careful not to burn it. Then add in the onions, chillies, ginger and chicken stock cube. Stir fry for about 2 minutes.
- Add in tomatoes, saffron, cumin seeds and thyme. Cook for about 3-5 minutes.
- Add in honey and squeeze the juice out of the lemon. Add in the zest. Mix thoroughly.
- At this point, you can add in the chicken and add enough water to cover the chicken. Let it simmer for about 10 minutes, until the liquid is slightly reduced before serving. Alternatively, place the chicken in an oven dish. Once the gravy is mixed well, pour the gravy over the chicken which you have laid out in the oven dish
- Sprinkle the onion flakes and cranberries over it and cover. Put it in the over for 30 minutes at 160 degrees celcius. Carefully stir the gravy and the chicken at least once at about 15 minutes to distribute the flavour (I prefer the alternative as the chicken seems to absorb the flavours from the gravy better and the chicken will not get too dry from the earlier frying)
- Serve hot with rice, couscous or salad.
Eat, Play, Clove should be brewing with a recipe any minute now and I can’t wait to feature what she has made. Thanks Gen, for the great combo of ingredients! This has been a lot of fun and let’s toast to next month with different ingredients/theme to experiment with!
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Monthly Mystery Munchies features every first Friday of the month in collaboration with Gen, Author of Eat, Play, Clove. Next month will be my turn to suggest a theme and I have a few weeks to come up with something. Until then! 🙂
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I’m dying right now from dehydration from drooling so much! I had a feeling you would use chicken, but isn’t it interesting how we used most of the same other ingredients? Twinsies! This is fantastic Ann, what a wonderful recipe and clearly you put a lot of effort into it. Two words: lemon gravy. Be still my beating heart! Well done and have a fabulous weekend! Looking forward to next month and your Sunday Humour post! Xoxo
Oh you CANNOT, CANNOT die on me! :p There’s next month to think about!!! LOL.
Yes, unfortunately. I mostly ever cook with chicken and beef because we don’t eat pork and Silver Bullet don’t eat seafood. 🙁 Sad, sad for a seafood foodie like me, especially when I cook for the family. And if I cook using seafood, it’s mainly for myself and the kids. Hmmm..I should do that! :p Saw your list of ingredients…tumeric, cumin… hahaa! Twinsies, indeed. They are always good spices to use.
You have a good one too, Gen! The pressure for next month is on…I still can’t think of anything. But this has been great. xxx.
YUM! Save me some, I’m coming over 😀 What a wonderful list of ingredients! A feast for eyes and, I’m sure, the taste buds. Wishing you an amazing weekend, Ann!
You’ll really have to hurry, Jas. Ain’t much left! Oh well, I’ll just have to make you a fresh one and that’d be better than left-overs! 😀
Oh my goodness – this looks absolutely delicious! I will have to try it – visiting over from #weekendbloghop 🙂
Hello Joy! Good to see you here. Let me know how it works out once you try it! Thanks for dropping by! 🙂
I’d must seek advice from you here. Which is not something Which i do! I love reading an article which will make people feel. Also, thank you for allowing me to comment!
You are most welcome, Brenton! 🙂