Chicken With Curry and Apples |
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Prep Time: 10 Minutes Cook Time: 120 Minutes |
Ready In: 130 Minutes Servings: 6 |
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The smell of curry and apples slowly pot-roasting half the afternoon will drive the family wild as they wait for this moist, tender chicken to make it to the dinner table. Ingredients:
1 roasting chickens or 1 stew hen |
2 tart cooking apples, cored and coarsely chopped |
1/4 cup raisins (can substitute 1/4 cup coarsely chopped dried apricots for a sharper, tangier flavor) |
1 -3 tablespoon curry powder |
1/4 teaspoon ground cumin (optional, some curry powder doesn't have as much cumin in it as i like, some does) (optional) |
1 pinch celery seed |
1 garlic clove, crushed |
1/4 cup plain yogurt |
1/4 cup chicken stock |
Directions:
1. Place the chicken in a dutch oven or a roaster with a tight-fitting lid.
2. Surround the chicken with fruit.
3. Sprinkle the curry, cumin, garlic, and celery seed over the chicken.
4. Mix the yogurt with the chicken stock. Pour half over the chicken and half over the fruit.
5. Cover and roast at 300 for 2-3 hours or at 250 for 3 hours. You can remove the lid for the last half hour or so to get better browning.
6. The meat will be very tender - falling off the bones (a stew hen may have more integrity depending on how tough it started before you tenderized it with the moist heat).
7. Serve with plain rice or pilaf (try Pilaf With Summer Squash ). I find that dark green and dark yellow veggies go particulary well with curry so some grilled yellow squash, a spinach salad, baked sweetpotatoes, or steamed broccoli would all be tasty sides.
8. Note - Curry powder varies wildly in flavor, intensity, and heat from brand to brand. Unless you're sure how much you like start with less and adjust after tasting. But do the tasting near the end of the cooking process because the flavor develops as it cooks.
9. Note - Cortlands, Macoun, and other apples from the Macintosh family are good. Macs themselves will cook to applesauce though so the texture of the finished dish will be lacking. Granny Smith taste great, but stay firmer than I like. Fujis may be the best of the common, grocery store apples for this dish. Red Delicious are useless - all sugar and crunch with no flavor. Best of all, if its fall and you have local apple orchards go ask the grower for his/her best, in-season cooking apple because some varieties are very local and have very short seasons.
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