In Italy, this dish is known as ‘chicken cacciatore’ which translates as ‘hunter’s chicken’ due to the fact it’s made ‘hunter’s style’ in just the one pot, and also because it very often uses braised rabbit instead of chicken. This dish is better the longer you cook it for, so a good one for the weekend when you’ll likely have more time and inclination for a spot of slow cooking. The recipe below serves two assuming two pieces of chicken each, but feel free to double the ingredients and freeze the rest for another day. Serve with a wholegrain of your choice like rice or barley to bump up your vitamin and mineral intake.
What's the A to V?
Poultry is a great source of B2 and B3, not to mention zinc, iron, chromium and whole host of other vitamins and minerals. The tomatoes and peppers provide a good vitamin C boost, the garlic and onion a hit of sulphur, and if you serve it with a whole grain such as barley (farro) or brown rice you’ll be getting a nice amount of B vitamins in there too.
Ingredients (serves 4):
500-800g of chicken pieces (use wings and or thighs rather than breast meat to get that more tender ‘falling off the bone’ effect).
2 large red or yellow peppers, cut into chunky strips
1 red onion, diced
10 olives (purple or black work best)
3 cloves of garlic, chopped into rounds
1 dried chilli, or 1 tsp of harissa paste
400g tin of chopped tomato
1.5 tbsp of tomato puree
2 tbsps of olive oil
A few glugs of red/cooking wine (optional)
2 sprigs of rosemary
A splash of water
Method
Drizzle olive oil into a large saucepan or casserole dish. Add the garlic, onion, and chilli and cook for three to five minutes until the onion is soft and translucent looking.
Add the pepper. Season your chicken pieces (I use salt, pepper, and garlic or onion salt) and add to your pan. Leave to sear for a couple of minutes before adding your wine.
After a further 5 minutes of cooking add in your tomato puree and tinned tomato along with your olives. Give everything a good stir, then cover your dish with foil or the lid (taking care to leave a gap for breathing space if you’re using a lid), and turn the heat right down.
Cook for one to two hours on low heat depending on how long you’ve got before hanger gets the better of you, stirring every 30 minutes or so. After an hour you may find you need to add a bit of water to the pan to stop the sauce reducing too much.
Serve with brown rice or barley, and perhaps some nice leafy greens like broccoli or spring greens with peas for another portion or two of veg.