Have some chicken with your garlic

Mr P over at Delicious Delicious Delicious was enthusiastically commenting on the beauty of a cabbage recently. I couldn't agree more that many ingredients, in their raw state are a feast for the eyes. These garlic cloves for example. Their shape is beautiful, the satiny sheen like a dress I might have worn back in the 80's, and yes, the colour - perhaps the eyeshadow I wore around the same time? Prettier on the garlic perhaps than it ever was on me!

I love the garlic at this time of year, locally grown, and all the cloves large and useful. None of those pitiful little inner cloves that you find on the white garlic out of season, which is imported (I think from China). OK, I admit, I couldn't go without my garlic, so will continue to buy it out of season, but YAY, in-season garlic is so much more agreeable.

The perfect recipe for all this garlic is out of Moro The Cookbook, from Sam and Sam Clark. I suspect pretty well anyone who is into food, and into food blogs knows about this book, and has cooked extensively from it. This is my first attempt at popping such a lot of garlic cloves under the skin of one chicken.

Chicken Stuffed with Garlic and Coriander

1 chicken (I used a 1.8kg, recipe calls for 1.5kg)
olive oil
juice of 1/2 a lemon (optional)
salt
pepper

Stuffing

3 garlic bulbs (I think we tend to call them 'heads' of garlic here)
enough milk to cover the garlic in a small saucepan by at least 3cm
approx. 40 saffron threads
1 bunch fresh coriander (called for small, I think mine was on the large side)
1 1/2 tsp ground cumin
3 tsp olive oil

To prepare the stuffing, break the garlic into cloves, removing excess papery skin, centre stem and base, but don't peel the cloves. Pop them in a small saucepan with enough milk to cover (as above) and bring to a simmer and cook gently simmering for about 25 minutes. Coarsely chop the coriander leaves.

Put the saffron threads into a cup and pour a few tablespoons worth of the milk over the saffron, and leave to infuse. Pour away the remainder of the milk, and either pass the garlic through a mouli, or squeeze out the soft centre of each clove using your hands. Smoosh the garlic into a puree and add to it the cumin, oil, infused milk and saffron and coriander. Preheat your oven to 220C.

Clean up your chicken if you are so inclined, dry it and then using your fingers, work the skin away from the flesh, wriggle your fingers right down to the thigh and drumstick as best you can. Push the stuffing between the skin and flesh, pushing along the outside to help work it to the further parts of the chicken that are harder to reach from within. If there is any stuffing leftover, put it into the chicken's cavity.

Now the suggestion is you can use a boned chicken or leave it whole, I left it whole. I also chose to truss the chicken, which wasn't part of the instructions. I like to truss a chicken that has been stuffed under the skin, as I think it helps keep the skin in it's place a little better.

Lightly oil the roasting dish and the chicken, sprinkle over salt and pepper. I started my chicken breast-down for 30 minutes, before turning it to finish cooking 'right way up' (technically this is wrong way up were the chicken still active) and gave it another 30 minutes this way. When the chicken is cooked (the leg should feel loose if you try to wiggle it), set it aside to rest.

To make the gravy, remove most of the fat from the roasting tray, squeeze in the lemon juice and add 100ml of water, some salt and pepper. Put the tray onto the heat, bring it to the boil and scrape off any caramelised bits and pieces from the tray. Taste for seasoning, then pour into a serving jug.


Rather annoyingly I ripped the skin when I turned it. I suppose I could have let it sit just the one way, but we do so like the crispy brown skin to be all over. Most of the time I can turn a chicken without a skin tear, so I wont give up this option.

The garlic here, while very obviously garlicky, isn't so intense as to drive sensitive tastebuds away. All three little ones enjoyed this, the garlic made relatively mild by it's milky poaching time, though rest assured, you are left in no doubt you've eaten garlic at the end of it all.

I can't get enough roast chicken, and this is just another variation on what is possibly my favourite theme. Delightful dish, and fun to make.