Inspired by a grand chef on www.thechefproject.com , I adapted his Chicken Chorizo and Olive Stuffed Pastry and came up with this stunning result:
Ingredients – amounts depending on availability and choice:
Chicken portions or spring chickens (poussin) which could easily serve 2 -3 persons each.
Chorizo sausage – sliced (Marks and Spencer fresh chorizo is simply divine here)
Onion or spring onion
Garlic
Red pepper
OLIVE OIL
Salt and pepper to taste
White wine
Bay leaf
Small tomatoes
Capers
Method:
- Preheat oven to 200 ˚C
- Cut the chicken lengthwise through the middle
- Chop spring onions – add.
- Crush/chop garlic – add. (Keep in mind that your chorizo might be quite spicy/garlicky – adapt quantities accordingly)
- Slice red pepper and add.
- Drizzle over some olive oil and season to taste with salt and freshly ground black pepper.
- Bake uncovered for 20-30 minutes to brown the chicken but not burn the onion and garlic – then turn heat down to 80-100 ˚C.
- Add 60-125 ml white wine per 3 poussin
- Add a good handful of small tomatoes, and a teaspoonful of capers per poussin.
- Add chorizo rings.
- Cover well with tin foil and bake for 2-3 hours till tender.
- In the meantime you may prepare a chicken stock by boiling the wing tips, a bay leaf or two, a celery stick and chopped carrot (or take the short cut of using a low-salt vegetable stock powder or cube).
- Now you can take the lazy shortcut by simply thickening the stock with cornflour or a chicken gravy thickener and adding it to the pan juices, OR you can do the honourable thing and drain the pan juices, adding it to the stock and reducing it to an acceptable consistency (watching over it carefully while it simmers to evaporate to about half the volume)
- Serve with brown or white rice and a green salad.
- A nice loaf of home-baked crusty brown bread and butter is a divine accompaniment.