The Greasy Spoon | It's not just about Haute Cuisine...

Chicken Tagine with Preserved Lemons and Green Olives

 

 

As promised, here's a recipe for a classic Moroccan Chicken Tagine with Preserved Lemons and Green Olives. I've based it on a dish from the 280 year old Riad Enija- this was a mouth wateringly hip establishment in Marrakesh we were lucky enough to stay at for our honeymoon a year or so back, lovingly restored by a Swedish UNESCO architect, his slightly Gothic wife and their slinky Pharonic stray cats. 

My last post described how to make the Preserved Lemons. First, you will need to make a marinade. In your favourite mixing bowl combine: lemon juice, the pulp (ie interior flesh) from the Preserved Lemons, salted butter, chopped onions, minced garlic, saffron strands, pepper, chopped and peeled ginger, sea salt, chopped parsley and "ras-el-hanout".

 

 

"Ras-el-hanout" is a spice mix or paste, which you can easily grind up yourself in a pestle and mortar. There are no rules, per se, but it the mix could easily include cardamom, clove, cinnamon, ground chili pepper, coriander, cumin, nutmeg, peppercorn and turmeric, all according to your own taste or whim.

Marinate the jointed chicken for about half an hour. Next, heat the base of a tagine on your stove. A tagine (as I'm sure all you Sunday Times and Observer readers know only too well) is a decorative Moroccan clay cooking pot, which you should be able to buy easily enough online, or of course, from Morocco itself. It's a sort of cross between an earthenware cooking pot and a clay pan. Please bear in mind that it's essential to buy a metal "heat diffuser" to place underneath it, otherwise the tagine will almost certainly crack. The conical funnel bit (or lid) heats the food from all sides.

The tagine will get blisteringly hot: you bring the piping hot tagine to the table and your friends will be amazed and delighted as you whisk off the top to reveal the sizzling chicken tagine beneath. The tagine is then served directly from the pot. I'm also tempted to buy one of those rather chic, but pricey, Emile Henry tagines, which you can buy on amazon. Expensive, but much more convenient, as there's going to be no need for the diffuser.

Add a dash of sunflower oil to the base of the tagine and warm it through. Throw in the marinated chicken and brown. Rinse the Preserved Lemons, scrape off any remaining pulp from the inside and cut the skin into thin strips. Scatter over the chicken in the tagine.

Add a little water. Place the lid over the tagine and leave to simmer for an hour. Check from time to time that it has not dried up, and if it's in danger of doing so, add some more water. About fifteen minutes before the cooking time is up, add the de-stoned green olives. Check the seasoning and scatter with freshly chopped mint. Serve with cous cous. 

An extremely simple, but effective dish, courtesy of Azziz of the Riad Enija, Marrakesh.

 

 

Patrick Lichfield (1939-2005)

Paul and Talitha Getty, Marrakech, Morocco, January 1969, for American Vogue, from an edition of 50.

Preserved Lemons

 

 

Preserved lemons are an essential ingredient in an authentic Moroccan tagine. You can't really use ordinary lemons, as the taste of preserved lemons is different: sour, fragrant and salty. They would make a fantastic present for someone; I can't think of anything more cheerful than a jar of home-made preserved lemons.

Making them is easy enough, and fun; wash the lemons thoroughly, then take a lemon and slice it downwards, in quarters, but leaving the bottom intact (ie finishing the cut an inch or so from the stem), so that your cut forms an X shape.

Open up the cut lemons and pack them with generous amounts of coarse sea salt. Pack the lemons into a clean glass kilner jar. Pack them tightly, so that the juices from the lemon fill the jar. If you're in the mood, you can add some dried spices to taste: bayleaves and coriander seeds would be good; a dried chili is another possibility. I tried adding thyme once, but it didn't really work. The brine turned the fresh herb a bit brown and it didn't look as aesthetically appealing as it should have done.

Store away in the larder for a few days. Take it out and have a look at the jar. Ideally, the juice should cover the lemons. If not, pour in some fresh lemon juice so that the lemons are covered. 

The preserved lemons will be ready to use in a month's time, and should keep for a further six months if stored in a cool place.

To use them, wash the salt of the preserved lemons, scrape out the pulp and pith and cut up the skin into strips. 

For my next post, I'll put up a recipe for a genuine Moroccan Tagine with Preserved Lemons.

 

Aziz of Marrakech's Courgette Soup

 

 

More on things Moroccan. The food at the Riad Enija was excellent. The owner, Björn (a former architect with UNESCO) reckoned that his chef, Aziz, might be one of the best chefs in all Marrakech. This could be true. The food, although simple, was delicious.  

We signed up for the Riad's cookery "course" (in effect, more of a cookery demonstration) and watched as he prepared a smooth melon and ginger soup, followed by a tajine, cooked with baby okra which we had bought at the spice and vegetable market in the Mellah (the walled Jewish quarter) that morning.

 

 

One of the first dishes we sampled at the Riad was Aziz's courgette soup. I'm not sure if it was especially Moroccan, but who cares?- it was exceedingly good. Smooth, piping hot, creamy- with dollops of taste, and a nice, clear, fresh green colour to boot. I persuaded him to give me the precise recipe. Here it is, courtesy of Aziz of Marrakech:

You take a large pot, and into that you put: a kilo of chopped baby courgettes (zucchini), two crushed garlic cloves, a sliced white onion, parsley, 20g butter, and a dash of a decent salt. You pour in 1 ½ litres of water, and simmer for half an hour on the stove.

Afte

r the time is up, take it off the heat and pulse the liquid with a blender until it is smooth. Taste and if needed, add more seasoning, including 

pepper.

 

Aziz showed us a jar of those mixed coloured peppers in red, green and "white" and gave us the thumbs up sign- or Moroccan equivilent; he seemed, for some reason, to have an aversion to black pepper.

 

Strain it through a sieve and serve hot.

 

 

Moroccan Scrambed Eggs with Tomato and Oregano

 

 

One of the best things you can do when travelling is to keep an eye out for small details that might improve your cooking when you get home. Last year, when we were touring Alsace-Lorraine, I noticed that the French use far more salt and pepper in their cooking than we do; and this humble observation has made a substantial difference to my cooking.

The fabulous Riad Enija serve iced water in large jugs stuffed with fresh mint, leaving the water with a subtle menthol taste, which, I'm sure would go down well in the dusty, humid dog days of a London August. A useful hint.

Breakfast at the Riad Enija was on the French model, with a Morroccan twist: beghrir (honeycomb griddle cakes), pancakes, slices of cheese, pastries, croissant, black coffee and orange juice. With this came what they called a "Moroccan omelette". Actually, it was really what we would call scrambled eggs, flavoured with chopped tomatoes and oregano.

 

 

I think I've worked how it's made: add a dash of olive oil to a flat pan, and add chopped tomatoes. Cook them for a few minutes. Next, add three or four lightly beaten eggs, and swirl them around until they start to set. Season with a generous helping of oregano, salt and freshly ground black pepper.

The Marrakech Express

 

 

Hooray!  We made it in the end.  You may have noticed that I haven't written a post for about a month.  I'm not really that apologetic: for some reason inspired by insanity, The Girl and I decided not only to get married (formal, traditional City of London wedding) but sell her flat, and my hovel, buy a new house, go on honeymoon and hold down our jobs- all at the same time. The honeymoon was in that fascinating halcyon, lotus eating city, Marrakech; or is it Marrakesh?

The "cuisine" of Morroco is undoubtably interesting, and currently de rigeur amongst trendy food writers. It's difficult to say anything against it. Yup, It's all good stuff- but please allow me to be a tiny bit critical: the Morroccans don't really have a tradition of eating out at restaurants (a bit like the British, albeit until a few years ago), and there is a distinct lack of variety in Marrakech's restaurants (may I suggest for m'sieur a traditional preserved lemon and olive chicken tagine, followed, by a tagine of beef, prunes and almonds?).

How am I going to play this?  'Cos, I've got lots to tell.  Probably best in snippets.

The photograph shows a snail soup seller in the Jemaa El Fna.  The Jemaa El Fna is a large tarmcadamed square in the middle of Marrakech. At night it comes alive with snake charmers, acrobats, story tellers, tarot card readers, Berber tatoo artists, witch doctors, monkey trainers, dentists and dancers from the Sub-Sahara.  It's Medieval, and not just for gormless American and French tourists.  How many of them, par example, would have a tooth pulled by old Mohammed, the Jemaa El Fna's on-spot dentist, or haggle for a bit of frizzled lizard from one of those charming Nubian apothecarists?

The new Mrs Aitch and I decided to sample the snails.  There are about four or five snail stalls in Marrakech, each with their own number written up on a bit of old wood.  As you walk past, the stall owners try to hustle you to their wares, and they're good at it.  If you decide to take to plunge, you sit down on one of the formica stools at the front of the stall, and the stall owner scoops up a bowl of snails from his steaming hot pan. A bowl costs ten dirhams.

The snails are served in their shells with a sort of brown coloured snail stock, which I suspect is flavoured with thyme, cinnamon- or possiblty cumin, and a snifter of lemon juice.  They're small in size and reasonably gothic- heads, antennae and all, and various bits and pieces or "waste" (is that the right euphanism?) falling out of the snail body- which, I'm almost positive chefs remove in the glorious French Republic.

The snails were- er...snail like, and Mrs Aitch (not a fussy one, I've discovered; all power to her), thought the "snail stock" tasted a bit like a consommé.  There was definitely thyme in there somewhere, and perhaps a bit of lemon juice. They were good- good enough to return for a second helping.

 

The Greasy Spoon recovering from post-wedding stress at the Riad Enija

Moroccan Lamb Koftas in Tomato Sauce

 

 

One of the most interesting things about Morocco, apart from its fascinating culture and beautiful Islamic architecture, is the food. As Morocco used to be a former French colony, it enjoys a subtle and sophisticated cuisine, which is part North African, part French in influence.

I love Marrakesh, with it's Foreign Legion style ramparts set against the stunning backdrop of the snow-capped Atlas Mountains. I've cooked this dish often, and it goes down especially well at buffets. You should be able to buy a tajine (which is a clay cooking pot) reasonably easy; otherwise it would be a good excuse to get on that Marrakesh Express- and buy one there in the Souk.

First, dry roast some cumin and coriander seeds in a frying pan. This is simplicity itself: just cook the seeds in a hot frying pan (without any oil), until they turn slightly brown, and start to jump around the pan. Next, grind the cooked seeds up in a pestle and mortar, to form a powder.

In the Magimix, whizz up some minced lamb, three small chopped onions, some chopped mint, chopped coriander leaves, salt and pepper, and the ground cumin and coriander. Spoon out the lamb mixture into a bowl, and form small meat balls (or Koftas) with your hands. Next, fry the Koftas in olive oil, until they are brown on all sides.

To make the sauce, fry some chopped onions and garlic in olive oil. When they are soft, add a tin of chopped tomatoes, a stick of cinnamon, and salt and black pepper. Cook the sauce down on a medium heat to thicken it up. All that's left do to now, is to shove the dish into the oven at a medium to high heat.

Ideally, you would use a tajine- as the clay pot creates an even heat, and cooks the Koftas and Tomato Sauce from all sides; though of course you could always use an ordinary casserole dish. Finish the Lamb Koftas off with a squeeze of lemon juice.