Lemon Tagine
There’s something special about cooking with clay. The heating is more even than what you would get in a regular skillet, and the liquid that gets released from the food while it cooks bastes the food keeping it moist.
- Prep Time: 65
- Total Time: 1 hour 5 minutes
- Yield: 4-6 persons 1x
- Cuisine: R471
Ingredients
2 teaspoons paprika
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon turmeric
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 chicken, 3 to 4 pounds, cut into 8 pieces (or 3 to 4 pounds of just chicken thighs and legs, the dark meat is more flavourful)
Salt
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 onion, chopped
The rind from 1 preserved lemon, rinsed in cold water, pulp discarded, rind cut into thin strips (if you don’t have preserved lemon, use whole thin slices of regular lemon)
1 cup green olives, pitted
1/2 cup Prunes
1/2 cup water
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
1/4 cup chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
5 baby potatoes
Instructions
- Combine all the spices—paprika, cumin, ginger, turmeric, cinnamon, black pepper—in a large bowl.
- Pat dry the chicken pieces and put in the bowl, coat well with the spice mixture. Let the chicken stand for one hour in the spices.
- Brown Chicken pieces, if you are using a clay tagine (if you have one, you must soak the bottom in water overnight before using), place it on a heat diffuser on the heating element to prevent the tagine from cracking, and place the olive oil in the tagine and heat it on medium heat.
If you do not have a tagine, you can use a thick-bottomed, large skillet with a cover. Heat the olive oil in the skillet on medium high heat. - In either case, sprinkle the chicken pieces very lightly with salt (go easy on the salt, the olives and preserved lemons are salty) and place skin side down in the tagine or skillet for 5 minutes, until lightly browned.
- Lower the heat to medium-low, add the potato, garlic and onions over the chicken. Cover and let cook for 15 minutes.
- Add the lemon, olives, prunes, water, then cover and sim-mer:
- Turn chicken pieces over. Add the lemon slices, olives, rai-sins, and 1/2 cup water. Bring to a simmer on medium heat, then lower the heat to low, cover, and cook for an additional 30 minutes, until the chicken is cooked through and quite tender.
- Mix in fresh parsley and cilantro right before serving. Adjust seasonings to taste.
