Hoendertjie met appelkosies (Chicken with apricots)
Shortly after my husband and I were married, he asked me to prepare his favorite dish: chicken with apricots. He described it to me and I said I would be happy to do it; all I needed was a recipe. He insisted that no recipe was needed: just stuff a chicken with apricots and currants and bake it. Of course, that didn't sound right and it wasn't. He insisted that I had done something wrong and I reminded him that I followed his instructions exactly. Because he was not yet properly trained, he didn't let it go and he had already pushed the boundaries by claiming the failure of the meal was my fault. I declared that under no circumstances would I ever prepare this dish ever again. Ever! You want it, then go home and have mommy make it, which is exactly what he did. Well, we both did. When we visited my in-laws in South Africa a few months later, his mother did prepare this dish. I told her about how her son had tried to get me to make it without a recipe and with the most basic of instructions and she laughed. Of course, I needed a recipe and she offered to give it to me. However, at the time, I was determined to stick to my guns and never make it myself.
But it sure was good!
After a cooling-off period of nearly 14 years, I decided my détente with this dish had gone on long enough. It was time to declare a truce and give it a try. My mother-in-law dictated the recipe to my father-in-law who emailed it to me.
It turns out the recipe was not South African at all, but my mother-in-law found it in a Belgian magazine when they were living in Amsterdam in the early 70s. Even though I followed the recipe as best I could, I could never quite get it right. It turns out that the bullion cubes I was using were wrong. I had been trying to use the rock-hard cubes you often find in American stores, but what I needed were the soft cubes that are probably more common in Europe. I tried using these and that made all the difference!
Okay, so enough about my nearly 15-year odyssey to culinary perfection and the lives of countless chickens whose lives were taken in vain. Let's cook!
The original recipe called for using a larger bird like a hen or a small turkey, but I have always used a regular broiler-fryer chicken. Therefore, I have cut the recipe in half from the original I received and Americanized the terminology. Here is what you need:
1 whole chicken
1 7-oz package dried apricots
1/2 package Zante currants
1 large onion, diced
2 Knorr chicken bullion cubes
2 slices bacon
1/2 cup wine or other liquid
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Cut the apricots in half. Mix apricots, currants, onion, and crumbled bullion cubes in bowl.
Prepare chicken as you normally would for roasting removing any inserts from the body cavity. Wash bird if you prefer to do so. Place bird in greased roasting pan or Dutch oven.
Stuff bird with apricot mixture. Any extra can be placed under or around the bird.
Cut bacon slices in half and lay them across the breast. This will add flavor to the meat and help keep in juices.
Pour wine or other suitable basting liquid in pan. Water is okay, but you might also try broth or orange juice.
Cover pan with lid or wrap tightly with foil.
Roast for 2 1/2 to 3 hours or until meat thermometer reads at least 165 degrees in various places deep in the meat, including the stuffing. If you want the bird to be nicely browned, you may want to remove the lid about 20 minutes before it's done and raise the heat to 425 degrees.
Allow bird to rest at least 15 minutes before carving.
Okay, so that's about it. Something else I did was to use a cast iron Dutch oven liberally greased with bacon fat and I felt that gave a very good result. I could probably write an entire post about my Dutch oven and probably will some day.
A few things I will try next time are to sweat the onions first as some bits of onion were still a bit crunchy. I will probably also adjust the apricot::currant ratio as I found this to be heavy on the currants, but seeming to need more apricots.
But it sure was good!
After a cooling-off period of nearly 14 years, I decided my détente with this dish had gone on long enough. It was time to declare a truce and give it a try. My mother-in-law dictated the recipe to my father-in-law who emailed it to me.
It turns out the recipe was not South African at all, but my mother-in-law found it in a Belgian magazine when they were living in Amsterdam in the early 70s. Even though I followed the recipe as best I could, I could never quite get it right. It turns out that the bullion cubes I was using were wrong. I had been trying to use the rock-hard cubes you often find in American stores, but what I needed were the soft cubes that are probably more common in Europe. I tried using these and that made all the difference!
Okay, so enough about my nearly 15-year odyssey to culinary perfection and the lives of countless chickens whose lives were taken in vain. Let's cook!
The original recipe called for using a larger bird like a hen or a small turkey, but I have always used a regular broiler-fryer chicken. Therefore, I have cut the recipe in half from the original I received and Americanized the terminology. Here is what you need:
1 whole chicken
1 7-oz package dried apricots
1/2 package Zante currants
1 large onion, diced
2 Knorr chicken bullion cubes
2 slices bacon
1/2 cup wine or other liquid
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Cut the apricots in half. Mix apricots, currants, onion, and crumbled bullion cubes in bowl.
Prepare chicken as you normally would for roasting removing any inserts from the body cavity. Wash bird if you prefer to do so. Place bird in greased roasting pan or Dutch oven.
Stuff bird with apricot mixture. Any extra can be placed under or around the bird.
Cut bacon slices in half and lay them across the breast. This will add flavor to the meat and help keep in juices.
Pour wine or other suitable basting liquid in pan. Water is okay, but you might also try broth or orange juice.
Cover pan with lid or wrap tightly with foil.
Roast for 2 1/2 to 3 hours or until meat thermometer reads at least 165 degrees in various places deep in the meat, including the stuffing. If you want the bird to be nicely browned, you may want to remove the lid about 20 minutes before it's done and raise the heat to 425 degrees.
Allow bird to rest at least 15 minutes before carving.
Okay, so that's about it. Something else I did was to use a cast iron Dutch oven liberally greased with bacon fat and I felt that gave a very good result. I could probably write an entire post about my Dutch oven and probably will some day.
A few things I will try next time are to sweat the onions first as some bits of onion were still a bit crunchy. I will probably also adjust the apricot::currant ratio as I found this to be heavy on the currants, but seeming to need more apricots.