Caribbean Brown Chicken Stew

  It seems very rare that I cook at home these days. My boys have grown, and fend for themselves, and, after a long day of cooking for the general public each day at work, I really can never be bothered when I get home.

The past 10 days I have been on sick leave from work. For a workaholic this is not good news, especially as the first few days found me bed bound and unable to walk. I'm now at the stage where I feel well in mind but my body is still slightly lagging behind and I'm bored!

Hopefully my return to work is imminent so my days now turn towards thoughts of new meals for the menu when I return.  

 

 

This week on the internet I came across this rather lovely dish called Caribbean Brown Chicken Stew made from lovely fresh chicken, vegetables and herbs, exactly the type of meal that would fit the café menu.
Not quite sure what makes it 'Caribbean' to be honest but I made it for my family and what a lovely, tasty meal. My son thought the chicken would also work well in a tortilla wrap.   

Lots of photos today. Cooking at home allows me more time.

Ingredient list - to serve 2-3 people

5 or 6 chicken thighs, skinned
Zest & juice of 1 Lime
4 Spring Onions, finely chopped plus 1 extra to garnish
2 Cloves Garlic, finely chopped
1 Red Chilli (or Scotch Bonnet if you like the heat) de-seeded & finely sliced
1 Tbsp Soy Sauce
1 Onion, finely chopped
1 Red Pepper, finely chopped
4 Sprigs Thyme
2 Inch Piece Ginger, peeled & grated
3 Tbsp Light Brown Sugar
25g Butter
Tin chopped Tomatoes

 

 

This isn't a speedy dish. Allow time to marinate the chicken, at least an hour, overnight if possible to taste the full flavour.

To marinate, place the chicken pieces in a bowl and add all the ingredients except for the sugar and tomatoes. Cover with cling film and keep chilled in the fridge.

 

 

 

 

 

When the chicken is ready to cook, remove from the marinade and pat dry with kitchen towel. Keep the marinade to one side as this adds to the stew later.

Heat the butter in a deep frying pan ( I used my wok) and add the sugar. As it begins to caramelise add the chicken pieces and fry until you have nice caramelised bits on both sides.

Remove from the pan and set to one side.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Using the same pan, add the marinade and fry for a few minutes to soften. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Add the chicken pieces and the tinned tomatoes and just enough water to cover the chicken. Season and simmer for about 20 minutes until the chicken is cooked and the sauce has thickened.

 

 

 When ready serve with rice and garnish with chopped spring onion.

 

  

 

Definitely on the menu next week!!  

 

 

 

Linking up this week with:
Tasty Tuesdays
Foodie Friday and Everything Else
Sweet and Simple Fridays

White Bean & Chicken Chilli

I can understand the concept of writers block must be truly frustrating and depressing for a person in that trade. Having to constantly be inventive, imaginative, inspiring and all in a time limit is a concept I know all too well.
We only have about 7 items on the café menu but they change each week and, every so often, I get 'chefs block' and struggle to produce the goods.

This week my struggle was with my menus hot dish. We only serve 1 a week so I try to keep customers interest with new ideas, classical twists and flavours.
I rarely look to google for my ideas, now I just stick to Pinterest. A truly amazing site where you can put together scrapbooks of all your favourite items on the internet and look at what everyone is scrapbooking.
Traditional chilli con carne is a dish that goes well at the café whenever I put it on so I got rather excited when I saw this White Bean & Chicken Chilli on Pinterest taken from a lovely blog
  The Cafe Sucre Farine .




White Beans & Chicken Chilli

A lovely little blog which I'm sure I will head back to for more ideas in the future.
Having bought all the ingredients I set about on Monday morning to put this little dish together and what a success! As always I got all the girls at work to have a taste test before going on the menu and a big thumbs up I received from them all. My only criticism was that I think I slipped with the chilli powder and cumin as it was slightly too hot for my palate. But then I am girl who only eats korma!!  

If you fancy trying this the recipe can be found here , I can honestly recommend!

White Bean & Chicken Chilli

Linking up this week with
Tasty Tuesdays
foodie fridays and everything else

And if you fancy following me on pinterest where you can find lots of new ideas you can find me Here

What's Cooking In Your Kitchen Tonight?

Apparently there was an article yesterday in a national newspaper (Daily Telegraph I think) about how we, as a nation, eat the same meals at home each week. It's a conversation that seems to pop up quite often and I remember, a few years ago, Jamie Oliver commenting that most people could do their weekly shop with their eyes closed as they buy exactly the same food items week in and week out.
Desite having quite a few diverse culinary skills at work, I hold my hand up to being one of these people! When I look at what we eat at home I can honestly say each week we have at least one mince meal (bolognaise,chilli or cottage pie), one stew, one stir fry,two convenience frozen meals and possibly one takeaway or a meal at the local pub.So tonight I decided to do something different at home!
Getting my wok out, and heating a small amount of olive oil in the bottom, I added some diced chicken fillet and chopped red onion and fried for a few minutes. To this I added some mild curry powder and tons of chopped vegetables from the bottom of the fridge. Baby corn, green beans, courgette,samphire and spinach gave this meal not only a vibrance of colour but a great deal of nutrition. To the wok I then added a 400g tin chopped tomatoes and 1/4pt vegetable stock and left to simmer for 10-15 minutes.

Cooking the curry

 

Just before serving I stirred in some coriander leaves (oh how I love coriander!) and then served up with some small roasted potatoes and naan bread.

Chicken & vegetable curry, roast potatoes and naan bread

 

 

It was lovely! Even my boys said how much they enjoyed it, although I did spot some courgette left on the side of one of the plates!
The only downside was that the house stank of curry all evening!!!
So what's cooking in your kitchen tonight??

HANDMADE PIE PRIDE

I never intended to become a chef when i was younger. Infact, i got unclassified in my cookery O level at school and trained as a nanny at college before realising that children actually really annoyed me!!!
To me, nowadays ,my job cooking is as much a handmade craft as is my hobby of sewing. Each dish i create contains as much passion, time and patience as any other craft.
Over the years my forte has become Handmade Pies. Infact it was one of my steak and ale pies that secured my job as head chef at Skylark Farm last year!!
So imagine my sense of pride this week when a lady popped into the cafe asking for 8 pies to take home to Oxfordshire with her and would pop into the local town to kill time whilst i cooked them for her.
And then, the following day, a very posh lady from the village came to see me with 2 large dishes. She was having a dinner party and could i make her 2 large pies , enough to feed 9 guests!
For me that was the best praise for my work that anyone could give and i was truely proud.

I now produce several pies per week for our farm shop.
Below are a batch of Chicken, Bacon and Leek straight from the oven. If you look closely you will see i even put a pastry chicken shape on top of each one.

And here are a batch of Steak and Ale. Look closely and see the pastry cow shape on!

So that's my week, now pop over to Handmade Monday blog hop to see what other passionate crafters have been up to this week