FOR THE FESTIVE SEASON
Helle Barlebo, from Chili Gourmet Catering, offers two delicious
recipes to prepare for dinner guests at home during the forthcoming
Christmas-New Year period…
CRISPY ROAST CHICKEN
(4 people)
INGREDIENTS:
1 fresh ecological free-range chicken
2 lemons
4 large garlic
fresh thyme & oregano
2 batatas (sweet potatoes)
SPICE MIX:
2 teaspoons baking soda
4 teaspoons Maldon salt
1 teaspoon grounded 5-pepper mix
1 teaspoon paprika (or pimentón dulce)
1 teaspoon cayenne chili powder
1 teaspoon oregano
olive oil (preferable in spray)
PREPARATION:
It took quite a few tests before I got my absolute favourite roast chicken just right, perfectly crunchy and tasty. This recipe might surprise you a bit because it includes baking powder which, it turns out, is good for quite a lot more than baking. The slightly alkaline mixture raises the skin’s pH levels, thus allowing proteins to break down more efficiently, giving you a crisper, more evenly browned result in the oven. Place the chicken in a big pan and give it a light spray with the olive oil. Take one lemon and poke several holes in it with a knife, so it releases lemon juice while cooking.
Put the poked lemon, some crunched garlic, a bit of salt and the fresh spices into the chicken. Mix all the spices together and rub them onto the skin of the chicken. Our favourite garnish, fast, easy and tasty… Cut the top off a full garlic, make slices of lemon and cut the batata in half and carefully cut the inside of the sweet potatoes, before putting some olive oil, Maldon flake salt and pepper on top. Add some fresh spices and chili if you want an extra spicy touch. Place it all into the pan together with the chicken and bake in the oven at 200 degrees for about 50 minutes.
VANILLA & GINGER PICKLED PUMPKIN
INGREDIENTS PRE-PICKLE:
1½ kg. fresh pumpkin
1 lt. boiled but lukewarm water
2 dl. vinegar
1 teaspoon salt
BOILING-PICKLE:
1 lt. water
1 fresh vanilla bean
25 gr. fresh ginger roots
1 fresh ecological lemon
2 teaspoons Atamon
600 gr. sugar
PREPARATION:
Clean and split across the fresh pumpkin, cut away all the hard skin and clean out the seeds from inside with a spoon. Keep the seeds for later, in case you want to grow your own plants, or slow-bake them in the oven for snacks or salad topping. Make five-centimetre slices of the pumpkin meat – or the size you prefer.
Mix all the pre-pickle together in a bowl, add the sliced pumpkin and leave it to marinate for 24 hours in the fridge. Make sure the liquid covers all the pumpkin (a plate on top could do the trick).
Prepare the boiling-pickle in a big pot with the water, sugar, Atamon lemon juice. Remove the skin of the ginger roots and cut them into slices. Open the vanilla and add both the seeds and the beans into the pot, then put it all to boil at high power. Remove and discard the liquid from the pre-pickle marinate, place the pumpkins in the boiling-pickle and leave them to boil for about four to five minutes. Carefully remove the pumpkins, vanilla beans and ginger, into some glass canning jars, which you have cleaned in advance with boiling water and given an Atamon-wash. Add the sugar, Atamon and lemon to the warm liquid and leave to boil for about 10 minutes. Carefully pour the liquid into the canning jars with the pumpkins, and close while they are still warm to seal.
Leave at room temperature for about a month before eating. Once open, store in the fridge. The pickled pumpkins can last sealed for about one year – if you haven’t eaten them by then.
Chili Gourmet Catering… by Helle Barlebo
Tel. (+34) 666 627 105
helle@chiligourmet.es / www.chiligourmet.es
