Stewed review: Chicken Cacciatore

After a hard day's work, slogging in the kitchen is the last thing on my mind, I would never resort to a ready meal but if it's in the form of a Stewed pot then count me in! Hungarian Goulash... yes please.

Delicious ingredients and no artificial flavourings or preservatives, good wholesome food, that you could cook at home, in a pot! What's not to love?

Cook at home you say? Oh, go on then. So Mr Stewed -Alan Rosenthal - has gone from a career in DVD product management (what does that mean anyway?) to a chef and now an author. There are 80 recipes in the book, Bahian chicken stew to duck braised in red wine, it's full of recipes that I said 'oooh Lancashire Hotpot, ooh Boeuf Bourgignon, ooh Swiss cheese fondue' at every page... until I got to Sticky Spare ribs and I said 'ooooh... wait a minute that's not a stew?'

The Chicken Cacciatore caught my eye on a dreary Monday evening so it was off to the shops to pick up the ingredients. Oh there was another reason why I chose it, it's one of the recipes in the book that has the least ingredients in... hello change in my purse.

So here's what you need:

To serve four you will need:

8 chicken thighs (I added drumsticks too)

Salt and pepper

4 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

10 unpeeled garlic cloves (not a new-boyfriend friendly recipe)

2 bay leaves

1 onion, finely chopped

250ml white wine

900g cherry tomatoes, halved

To serve:
Torn fresh basil

Here's how:

Season the chicken thighs with salt and pepper. Heat the oil in a wide pan that has a lid and will fit the chicken thighs in one layer, then add the chicken, skin-side down, along with the whole garlic cloves and bay leaves. Cook on a moderate heat for 5-7 minutes until the chicken skin is golden and crispy, then turn over and seal the second side for a minute or so. Transfer to a plate.

Remove the garlic cloves from the pan and set aside for later. Tip the onion into the pan that was used to fry the chicken and cook it for 7-10 minutes on a moderate hear until soft.

Add the wine, increase the heat and boil to reduce by about a half, then add the halved tomatoes.

At this point squish out the garlic from thir skins and plop them into the pan. The garlic should be soft and pulpy o it iwll break down into the sauce as it cooks. Season with salt and pepper and allow the tomatoes to cook for about 15 minutes on a moderate heat until they have turned pulpy and start to thicken a little.

Add the chicken pieces to the tomatoes, pushing them down into the sauce. Cook on a moderate eat for another 30 minutes until the chicken is ready and the sauce has become rich, thick and fruity with reduced tomato juices.

During cooking, give the pan regular shakes and scrapes to ensure nothing is sticking to the bottom. Rosenthal recommends turning over the chicken halfway through but I thought this might make the crispy skin go soggy so I didn't.

Serve with creamy mash... et voila

With the combination of the sweet roasted garlic and tomatoes infused in to the chicken it really was delicious. Done in less than an hour it's almost fast food but double the size and with the amount of butter I put in the mash, probably double the calories!

Who cares when it tastes that good though!

A week later and time for a visit from Big Sis. Once upon a time she didn't eat meat but she is slowly weaning herself back on to it, starting with chicken. So I thought why not make something to really push her to the limits... One quick look in Stewed and I saw the perfect recipe. Beouf Bourgignon. From what I'd heard I thought that it would be uber difficult with a million ingredients in . It was not and it didn't. It was simple and wholly effective, even Big Sis enjoyed the beef!

I love this book, I think it's excellent for weekend cooking - shoving everything in to a pot, leaving it to stew and serving it up to a group of hungover friends.

Who wants to borrow it?

Thanks to Caroline at Random House for my copy!