Chicken and fennel tajine

Serves 4 – 6

Ingredients:

🐔 1 large 2kg jointed organic freerange chicken 

🫒   Olive oil

🥬  2 bulbs fennel, cut into quarters

🧅 1 large onion, cut into rings

🧅 1 med onion, diced

🧄 3–4 cloves garlic, crushed

1 thumb fresh ginger, peeled and grated

1 tsp turmeric

1/2 tsp ground white pepper

2 pinches saffron

🌶️ 1/2 tsp paprika

1 heaped tsp Ras el Hanout (a Moroccan spice mixture)

1 tsp ground coriander

300 ml chicken stock

10 fat green pitted olives

🍋 1 preserved lemon, pips and flesh removed, rind chopped into 4 large pieces – a good brand is Belazu

🌿 Generous handful each of chopped fresh parsley and coriander

Directions:

Brown the chicken pieces in oil for several minutes until they have a nice golden colouring. Put to one side, then pour a couple of tablespoons of oil into the base part of your tagine (or your cookpot). Chuck in the onion rings, then mix the chicken pieces in a separate bowl with the diced onion, garlic, grated ginger and spices. Put the chicken, onion and spice mixture into the tagine base and add half a cup of stock.

Put the fennel quarters, chopped preserved lemon rind and olives around and on top of the chicken, squeezing them into the gaps. Everything should look roughly like this:

Now put your tagine base with all its bounty on a low heat (using a heat diffuser under your tagine is a good idea so that everything cooks evenly) and put the conical hat lid on and simmer away (the lowest simmer possible) for about 2 hours, until the meat is tender and comes away easily from the bone and the fennel is tender. Sprinkle with the fresh chopped parsley and coriander.

Serve with couscous to mop up all the delicious juices. Enjoy the sense of drama when you remove the lid of the tagine at the table…