Chicken and Chocolate

After somewhat of a slack period in terms of trying new recipes, in the past two days I have done a new variety of roast chicken and made some amazing chocolate brownie-type biscuits.

First the chicken. This came from yesterday’s Epicure in The Age. The recipe’s author Brigitte Hafner calls it Roast Chicken with Preserved Lemon and raves about it as “I love the delicious aromas of citrus, cinnamon and browning butter you get while the chicken cooks. For an accompaniment I like to throw some pumpkin into the baking dish to roast with the chicken and then toss it with cous cous and coriander leaves.” She’s not wrong. This was moist, full of flavour and the suggestion of roasted pumpkin and cous cous was inspired. Brigitte suggests a number 18 chicken for 4 people but I cooked a number 9 for two and there was enough left for us to have it for lunch today so I reckon a number 12 for 4 people would be enough.

INGREDIENTS
1.8kg free-range chicken
1/2 preserved lemon
2 tbsp butter, softened
about 1/3 cup coriander leaves, washed and chopped
salt and pepper
1 orange
3 fresh bay leaves (optional)
2 cinnamon sticks
about 2 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp paprika
1 tbsp butter, extra

METHOD
• Pre-heat oven to 180C.
• Rinse the chicken in cold water and pat dry with kitchen paper.
• Chop the preserved lemon and combine with the butter, coriander and a little salt and pepper. Now gently separate the skin from the breast by pushing two fingers between the skin and the meat. Push the lemon-butter mixture underneath the skin on each side.
• Season the cavity with a little salt and pepper.
• Pierce the orange several times with a knife to release its flavours, and fill the chicken cavity with the orange, bay leaves and cinnamon.
• Drizzle the chicken with olive oil and season liberally all over with salt, pepper and paprika. Place a few dobs of the extra butter on the breasts and place in a baking tray.
• Roast for 60-70 minutes (or less for a smaller chicken), basting with pan juices every 20 minutes, then remove from the oven and leave for 10 minutes in a warm place before serving.

Decadence Chocolate and Pecan Biscuits

Having got in the swing of cooking something new from last night, today I tried what Kuidaore blog calls Bittersweet Decadence Cookies. These are excellent biscuits mainly because they are basically just chocolate with a bit of flour and egg to bind them. The recipe below is essentially the same as Kuidaore except it is in metric and I use a microwave to melt chocolate a la Stephanie Alexander. I used Lindt couverture milk chocolate and this gave a fabulous result. Also because it’s professional grade chocolate I found it really easy to work with. Having said that, I still managed to burn the first tray. These biscuits only need 12 minutes and their bottoms burn really easily!
INGREDIENTS
1/4 cup plain all-purpose flour
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/8 tsp fine sea salt
225g bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, chopped
2 Tbsp unsalted butter
2 large eggs
1/2 cup caster sugar
2 cups pecans, broken into large chunks
170g extra bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, chopped into chunks approximately the size of a hazelnut

METHOD
• Preheat oven to 180C and line several biscuit sheets with baking paper.
• Mix together flour, baking powder and salt. Sift and set aside.
• Melt the 225g of chocolate and butter in a large microwave safe bowl for 2 minutes and stir till melted and smooth. Remove bowl from pan and set aside.
• In another microwave safe bowl, whisk together eggs, sugar and vanilla, warm for 20 seconds in the microwave. Stir eggs into the warm (not hot) chocolate. Stir in flour mixture, followed by pecans and chocolate chunks. (Note: The batter is fairly liquid and not unlike a brownie batter in consistency. This is correct).
• Scoop slightly heaped tablespoons of batter onto the prepared biscuit sheets 4cm apart and bake till surface is dry, set and glossy, but the centre is still gooey – about 12 minutes.
• Let biscuits firm up on baking sheet for a minute before transferring them to racks to cool completely. Store in air tight containers. Makes 36.

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