the review: chicken tagine (version 2)

Putting aside that it seems a little ridiculous to make a tagine from a recipe in The Daily Mail, this was my most successful tagine yet. The dish had great flavor thanks to a bit of orange zest and a simple combination of spices. Even the kids liked this one (ok, they liked the chicken and chickpeas but not the olives or onions). And I didn't burn it. 

I started by making a rough conversion of the original metric measurements. I then adjusted the recipe before cooking for some measurements that seemed a little out of proportion. Three onions to 1 1/2 pounds of chicken? I think not. Let’s go with one onion, shall we? Curiously, my husband’s only critique of the finished dish was that he felt it had too much onion. Imagine if I had included all three. He did acknowledge that he liked the flavor of the onion in the dish but there was more onion than substance. We decided that this could be fixed by doubling the chicken used in the recipe (I went with slightly over one pound of boneless, skinless chicken breast) in proportion to the onion.  

All conversions are either approximate or adjusted or both, but this is what I used:

2-3 Tbl. vegetable oil

1 ½ pounds chicken cut in 1-2 inch pieces

1 large onion, sliced

3 garlic cloves, minced

1 ½ tsp. fresh ginger

2 tsp. cumin

1 tsp. paprika

salt and pepper

¾ cup dried apricots

2 cans chickpeas

2 cans diced tomatoes

1 cup chicken stock

3 tbsp honey

2 long strips orange zest

2/3 cup pitted black olives

Cilantro to garnish

I did follow all of the directions in the original recipe except that I seasoned the chicken before cooking it and due to a break in the regular programming, the dish sat on the stove, turned off, for a bit between adding all of the elements and the actual cooking time. I'm pretty sure this didn't make any difference in the finished product but probably added cooking time (steam) to the chicken. 

Again, I think to be perfectly proportioned, I would either double the chicken and leave the rest alone or leave the chicken alone and halve everything else. We fed two adults and two kids with the slightly more than one pound of chicken version, and had plenty of leftover for a second meal. I would say this recipe easily feeds four adults, but that doubling the chicken would allow you to freeze enough to serve the meal twice with half the effort. We served the tagine over simple couscous, which was a perfect way to sop up the tasty liquid.

This dish got four votes of confidence last night. I’m still trying to create the perfect tagine, but this recipe will definitely go into the rotation. I'd love to hear what you think.