This chicken and apricot tagine is a great way of introducing Middle Eastern zing to an easy midweek supper idea. A hearty main course bursting with flavour and, like most one-pot cooking, its preparation time is minimal, meaning you can put your feet up and have a swift drink while you wait.
If your experience of Middle Eastern cuisine extends only to the infamous donner kebab, you’ll find a wealth of flavours waiting to be discovered that are fresh, wholesome, healthy, rich, aromatic – it is little wonder that Persian cooking and meze has grown in popularity.
This tagine dish of chicken and apricots cooked chickpeas and spices is an absolute delight; it is a high fibre meal and though we are all for healthy eating – this particular recipe was crying out to be accompanied by a couple of beers. Well, life’s too short.
Serves: 4
Preparation time: 10 minutes
Cooking time: 45 minutes
Ingredients
for the tagine
- 1 tbsp vegetable oil
- 8 chicken thighs, skinless
- 4 echalion shallots, peeled and cut in half lengthways
- 2 cloves garlic, crushed
- 2 tsp ground cinnamon
- 2 tsp ground cumin
- 1 tsp ground coriander
- 1 tsp turmeric
- 400ml chicken stock
- 6 tbsp apricot jam
- 400g chickpeas, tinned, drained
- salt and pepper to season
to serve
- 150g couscous
- zest of a lemon
- 220g Tenderstem broccoli
- small bunch of fresh coriander
- 2 tsp olive oil
Method – chicken and apricot tagine
Preheat the oven to 180C/ 160Cfan/gas 4. Heat the vegetable oil in a large casserole dish until sizzling hot. Brown the chicken pieces on all sides. Once the chicken is browned, remove from the dish and set aside. You may need to do this in two batches if your casserole dish isn’t big enough.
Turn the temperature down to a medium heat and put the shallots in the casserole dish with the lid on and cook for 5 minutes until they are coloured and starting to soften. Add the crushed garlic, all the spices and stir in.
Pour in the stock, stirring well, then stir in the jam. Return the chicken to the dish and tip in the chickpeas, season well then stir to coat everything with the stock. Put the lid back on and cook in the oven for 10 minutes. For the perfect chicken and apricot tagine, remove the lid and continue to cook for another 20 minutes until the chicken is cooked and the sauce has thickened.
While the chicken is cooking, put the couscous in a bowl and stir in the lemon zest then continue to prepare as per the pack instructions. Steam the Tenderstem for a 3-4 minutes until tender. Once the couscous is ready, fluff with a fork and tip into a large serving bowl. Stir in the coriander, Tenderstem and olive oil and season to taste. Divide the couscous between 4 plates and top with the chicken tagine.
This chicken and apricot tagine recipe was provided by streamlinefoods.
For more healthy recipes visit our Food and Drink channel.
About the Author / Gareth Hargreaves
Gareth looks after all editorial content on 50connect. He is the Swiss Army knife of content ideas and production.
