Category: chicken

Categories
chicken food red onion

general tso’s actifry chicken

general tso's chicken cooked in the tefal actifry

Isn’t it strange how two Western cultures can create their own version of the same imported cuisine? “Moo shu beef”, “egg rolls”, “crab rangoon”… What are these odd things? They’re found on menus of most Chinese takeaways (sorry,”takeout”) in America. Yet in the UK they’re completely alien. In my limited understanding, immigrants of different areas started these restaurants on different sides of the Atlantic and imported their food, Westernised: in the US, Hunan-influenced culture settled; in the UK Cantonese-style food dominated. General Tso’s chicken is one of these American staples, as I found out reading this recipe on Serious Eats. What is this? And why does it look so darn tasty?!

Copyright: J. Kenji Lopez-Alt

I’ll read just about any article by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt. They’re packed with excellent research, brilliant recipes and infectious enthusiasm. But the photo of this one drew me in. I knew straight away it was going to taste good, and I had to try it.

His comparison to chicken tikka masala is bang on – a dish that has become the representative dish of that cuisine, though natives have never heard of it!

Whatever the derivation, it’s crunchy chicken in a tangy-sweet sauce. It’s closest cousin on an English Chinese menu (if you follow my train of thought) is crispy chilli shredded beef.

I didn’t fancy breaking out the deep fat fryer so adapted the recipe for the Actifry. The fridge-drying phase is important – if you leave the chicken damp from batter it will slide straight off in the Actifry. The drying out allows the coating to properly adhere to the meat. It turned out brilliantly. The chicken was crisp yet juicy, the sauce was sticky, sharp and tangy, the whole thing comes together perfectly.

I think I’m going to go pester my local Chinese to add this to the menu.

Based on a recipe by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt at Serious Eats, tweaked and abused for my tastebuds

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general tso’s actifry chicken

Course Main Dish
Cuisine Chinese
Author Gary @ BigSpud

Ingredients

  • For the marinade:
  • 1 egg white
  • 2 tablespoons dark soy sauce
  • 2 tablespoons mirin
  • 1/4 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
  • 3 tablespoons cornflour
  • 450 g boneless, skinless chicken thighs cut into finger-sized pieces
  • For the dry coating:
  • 100 g flour
  • 100 g cornflour
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • For the sauce:
  • 3 tablespoons dark soy sauce
  • 2 tablespoons mirin
  • 2 tablespoons rice vinegar
  • 1 tablespoon vegetable stock powder
  • 4 tablespoons sugar
  • 1 teaspoon sesame seed oil
  • 1 tablespoon cornflour
  • 2 cloves garlic crushed
  • 1 inch ginger grated
  • 2 red onions peeled and sliced

Instructions

  • For the marinade: whisk egg white lightly in a large bowl, then whisk in the soy and Mirin. Set aside half of marinade for the dry coat. Add the soda and cornflour to one half of it and whisk to combine. Add chicken to large bowl and stir to coat thoroughly.
  • For the dry coat: whisk together the flours, baking powder, and salt. Add the reserved marinade and whisk until mixture has looks like breadcrumbs. Press the chicken into this mixture and shake off the excess. Place on a rack over a tray and place in the fridge for an hour.
  • Turn the Actifry on for 2 minutes to heat up. Add a tablespoon of oil and heat for a further minute. Add the chicken and cook for five minutes, then go in with some tongs to help separate some of the chicken pieces that may have stuck together. Cook for a further 25 - 30 minutes, until crisp and at least 68C on the inside.
  • Five minutes before the chicken is ready, fry the garlic, ginger, and onions in a frying pan over a medium heat. Combine soy sauce, wine, vinegar, stock, sugar, sesame seed oil, and cornflour in a small bowl and stir with a fork until dissolved and no lumps remain. Stir the sauce into the onions etc until it boils and thickens. Add the chicken and fold with a rubber spatula until all pieces are thoroughly coated. Serve with rice and mixed vegetables.
Categories
chicken cider food mushroom mustard

chicken in cider casserole

I seem to have a thing for baldy guys with glasses.

No, not that one this time. I’m talking about Adrian Edmondson.

I was a fan of the Young Ones growing up. Though I suspect I was too young I would sneak a look at my brother’s VHS tapes. Hole In My Shoe was the first song I bought. I kinda liked Filthy Rich and Catflap but I didn’t understand why Vyvyan and Rik were so different. Then Bottom arrived and I was smitten. Rude, comically violent and puerile slapstick was just what I wanted. GAS is one of my favourite 30 minutes of television ever, it’s just outrageously funny.

When someone says “do you want to have dinner with Ade Edmondson?” I barely stopped to breathe before replying yes.

Held at the wonderfully eclectic Food at 52, Ade was presenting a dish of his own devising: a cidery take on coq au vin. Fitting as the night was hosted by Merrydown cider. Not a cider I was familiar with but that was just another reason to say yes.

It was a very silly evening with bucketfuls of cider, Morris dancing and Ade plugging away at his casserole, enjoying himself and talking about his recent Celebrity Masterchef win (“I only had to beat 14 people!”). Reining in the urge to bark “squashed potatoes, your maaaa’am?” I took the opportunity for a quick chat. He seems to be over his comedy background and wants to move on to food and music; in fact a few days after the event he was off to Australia with his band. Ade also told Kavey and I he dreams of opening a pub with a menu that changes daily.

I promise you, the hat belonged to the Morris dancer

Aside from one toe-curlingly awkward moment where someone asked him if he’d ever tried stand-up (going to happen if you invite lots of young ‘uns I’m afraid) it was an evening of good food, good drink and lots of laughs.

I made the dish for friends only two days later, and it’s cracking. Dead easy too, just bung things in gradually and let it tick away. It’s the mustard seeds that make it. Don’t leave them out.

The recipe below for chicken in cider casserole (or “coq au cider” as he calls it) is Ade’s in all his own words. Many thanks to Merrydown for hosting an hilarious evening.

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chicken in cider casserole

Author Gary @ BigSpud

Ingredients

  • 4 chicken legs complete with the thigh
  • 1 teaspoon mustard seeds
  • 120 g lardons
  • 1 tablespoon Olive oil
  • 100 g butter
  • 3 cloves garlic chopped
  • 2 medium sized onions chopped
  • 2 sticks celery sliced
  • 2 medium sized carrots sliced
  • 4 sprigs fresh thyme
  • 2 leaves bay
  • 1 tablespoon flour
  • 1 large bottle Merrydown medium cider
  • 200 g small chestnut mushrooms

Instructions

  • Pour a glug of oil into a heavy bottomed pan or casserole dish. Once it is hot add half the butter. Once that has melted add the lardons and fry until they are very nicely browned, then remove them from the pan with a slotted spoon.
  • Season the chicken with salt and pepper and brown them in the oil, butter and left over fat from the lardons, then remove them from the pan too.
  • This is the fun bit – add a heaped teaspoon of mustard seeds to the fat and put on the lid. A glass lid is the most fun, as after a couple of minutes you can watch the seeds burst and fly about all over the place. The make shift tin foil lid is fun too though, as the exploding seeds cause brilliant indentations on the underside.
  • Once the seeds have all popped (after a minute or so) add the onions, garlic and celery, and gently cook them off until the onions are translucent.
  • Add a tablespoon of flour to the pan and stir until it has been absorbed – a kind of makeshift roux.
  • Pour in a little of the cider and stir, and keep adding more, stirring each time, until the cider has absorbed the roux.
  • Now add the carrots, return the chicken and lardons to the pan and add the sprigs of thyme and the bay leaves. You need to make sure the chicken is completely covered by the cider. Bring to the boil, then reduce the heat and leave to simmer, and cover it almost entirely with the lid – almost, but not quite – you want it to reduce, but not very quickly.
  • Leave to gently simmer away for an hour, checking occasionally – if it looks like it’s drying out too much add more cider.
  • When the hour is nearly up slice the chestnut mushrooms and fry them off in the remains of the butter – you want to get them nicely browned – once they are done, add them to the pan and leave it for a further 10 minutes. Serve with boiled potatoes to soak up that delicious sauce.
Categories
cauliflower chicken curry food

chicken tikka gobi

Quite often, when you get a new kitchen gadget, you play with it for a bit, then goes in a box never to be seen again. I’m sure many of us have consigned bread makers, ice cream machines and rice cookers to garages and lofts.

But this hasn’t happened with my Actifry. At least once I week I plonk it on the counter to rustle up some potatoey goodies, whether it’s chips, wedges or similar. I’ve been trying to branch out with it inspired by the accompanying mini recipe book that implies it can practically do anything. There’s a proper community out there for Actifry recipes – check out this Pinterest board for example. A curry seemed like an interesting place to go with it. So I went for a chicken tikka gobi, a tomatoey chicken and cauliflower curry.

I load up the ingredients for the first few minutes and let it do it’s thing. Because it churns and turns you don’t have to stir it, you can just leave it to get on with it.

The results were great. Really comforting midweek stuff. It tasted like a casserole-style curry that you’d make yourself at home in a similar timeframe, but just leaving it alone while you Netflix another episode of Fringe is very convenient. This isn’t the last Actifry experiment I’ll be trying, that’s for sure.

As part of the recipe, I used a jar of tikka paste that I had knocking about. It’s a Sainsbury’s one. I idly looked at the back of the jar at the recipe and had to do a double-take. I was surprised to see the old “seal the meat” line stinking up the place. I’d assumed that myth had been long since buried.

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chicken tikka gobi

Prep Time 5 minutes
Cook Time 40 minutes
Total Time 45 minutes
Author Gary @ BigSpud

Ingredients

  • 1 tablespoon tikka paste heaped
  • 1 tablespoon yoghurt heaped
  • 1/2 lemon
  • 2 chicken breasts diced
  • 1 teaspoon cumin seeds
  • 1 onion diced
  • 1 head cauliflower chopped quite small
  • 1 tin tomatoes

Instructions

  • Mix the paste, yoghurt, lemon and chicken together in a bowl and refrigerate for a couple of hours or overnight if you have the time.
  • Turn the Actifry on, add a spoon of oil and the seeds and leave it for a couple of minutes to heat up.
  • Add the onion and cauliflower and give them 5 minutes to cook. After 5 minutes add the chicken.
  • After another 10 minutes cooking add the tomatoes and half a tin of water and a pinch of salt.
  • Leave to cook for another 20 minutes, or until the chicken is cooked through. Do check for seasoning and whether it needs a little more salt or lemon juice. Serve with rice, naan or flour tortillas.
Categories
bacon brussels sprouts chicken cream food potatoes red onion

parmesan chicken with potato and sprout gratin

Yes! It’s sprout season again. Please don’t just boil them and leave them alone, there’s so much more to the little farty ball. Like here, a Brussels Sprout gratin baked with potatoes and cream for a great side dish.

There’s a video version of the gratin on my YouTube channel here:

I was chuffed with how everything turned out save for one flaw. To quote Michel Roux Jr “where’s the sauce?!” It needed a meaty gravy just to lend a little more moisture. But beyond that, it was dead good. A sprout is for Winter, not just Christmas.

Want more Brussels Sprout recipes? My Christmas dinner isn’t complete without sprouts and chestnuts, and you must check out my legendary sproutotto.

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parmesan chicken with potato and sprout gratin

Course Side Dish
Author Gary @ BigSpud

Ingredients

  • 500 g potatoes
  • 250 g Brussels Sprouts
  • 1 chicken stock cube
  • 1 red onion
  • 4 rashers smoked streaky bacon
  • 150 ml single cream
  • teaspoon wholegrain mustard heaped
  • 2 skinless chicken breasts
  • 1 tablespoon flour
  • 1 egg beaten
  • 2 handfuls panko breadcrumbs
  • 1 handful parmesan finely grated

Instructions

  • Get a large pan of water on to boil and preheat the oven to 200C.
  • Use a food processor to thinly slice the potatoes, and add them to the water with the stock cube. After 5 minutes pass the Brussels through the processor too and add to the water.
  • Heat a casserole dish over a medium heat. Thinly slice the onion and bacon and fry in a little oil in the dish until starting to colour. After the sprouts and potatoes have had 3 or 4 more minutes drain and add to the casserole dish. Stir well, season, pour in the cream, stir in the mustard and then transfer to the oven to cook uncovered for 15 minutes, until golden on top.
  • Meanwhile heat a frying pan over a medium heat. Bash the chicken breasts with a rolling pin until thin and season. Dust lightly in flour, roll in beaten egg and then in the parmesan and breadcrumbs. Fry in shallow oil on both sides until golden. To be sure use a probe thermometer checking it reaches at least 65C inside. Serve on top of the gratin.
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