For the Zest of Chicken!

The photo does no justice to this dish! I literally pulled the dish out of the oven and quickly snapped a picture before the sun totally vanished and without using those fantastic Photoshop programs that I don’t use…This is what I am left with. But trust me when I tell you this was DE-LISH! This  lemony dish punches you in the face with flavour when you take it out of the oven. One of the more preferred forms of punches I’d imagine.

I like the flexibility of cooking methods which I have written below. Last week  I had no time to muck about so I made this without browning off the chicken and it was lovely. Today I needed some kitchen therapy and took the extra time to brown of the chicken before placing it in the baking dish.

If I am honest, I prefer Method B because I love the colour of the chicken once I remove the dish from the oven.  That burnish brown just screams flavour to me. Do your dishes yell and scream at you too?

At the end of the day it just depends on what floats your boat… How long you have… Are you in the mood to wash up an extra pan? Either way I have provided both methods so you can do with that what you please 🙂

Note: I parboil the baby potatoes since they do take longer to cook regardless of which method I use. Cooking them until they are halfway done was the way to go 🙂

For the Zest of Chicken!
Serves 4

1/4 cup Light Olive Oil ( That is what I had on hand, use whatever you have)
9 Cloves of garlic, peeled
1/3 cup chicken stock
Zest and juice of 2 lemons
1 Tbsp dried oregano
1 Tbsp dried thyme
6 skin on,  bone in, chicken thighs
8 whole Baby potatoes  skin on
Salt and pepper to taste

 

Preheat oven to 200C.

Parboil the potatoes any way you fancy. Cook them until they are slightly less than fork tender. Once cooked, drain and cut the potatoes in half.

Put the olive oil, garlic, chicken stock, lemon zest and juice and the dried herbs into a mini food processor/blender (Nutri Bullet works really well here if you have one handy) and blend  until the garlic is finely minced and the sauce looks smooth and creamy. Season to taste

Pour the sauce over the chicken thighs and coat evenly.

Method A:
Place the potatoes in the bowl and toss in the sauce with the chicken and then pour everything into a large baking dish. Cook in oven for about 45 min or until chicken is cooked thoroughly.

Method B:

In a hot pan, brown the chicken skin side down only. 

When the chicken skin is golden, remove from pan and place in a large baking dish (Skin side up)

Toss the potatoes in the sauce and coat evenly.

Pour the sauce and the potatoes into the dish with the chicken and even out the dish.

Cook in oven for 45 minutes or until the chicken is thoroughly cooked.