Blackened cajun chicken with sweet potato and coconut stew

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Blackened cajun chicken with sweet potato and coconut stew
Development chef Chris Jones gives our feathered friends a tangy new twist

While working in my last restaurant in ,1999 I came up with this recipe after trying to create a perfect dish for a specials board. It became so popular, I put it on the main menu and could sell up to a hundred portions a week.

It combines heat, succulence, richness, pungent flavours and colours.

To make the dish for four, prepare a marinade by blending 100g olive oil, 100g tinned plum tomatoes, 50g tomato puree, 75g fresh coriander, 50g peeled garlic cloves, 40g clear honey, 20g fresh red chilli and 20g fresh peeled root ginger. Add cumin seeds, ground cayenne, smoked paprika, coriander seeds, thyme, oregano, sage, cardamoms, mustard seeds and fennel seeds and refrigerate for a day.

Then take four skin-on chicken breasts of 150-180g each (ask the butcher to leave no the wing bone and put five or six slashes in the pot of the breast). Place the chilled breasts into a bowl, add 30g marinade per breast and massage in.

Next, heat a heavy cast iron pan and add rape seed oil. As it strats to smoke, add the chicken, slashed side down, and cook until dark brown. Then turn the chicken over, place pan in a pre-heated oven (190-200 degrees celcius) and finish cooking for 10 minutes. Allow to rest for 10-15 minutes before serving.

To make the stew, heat 25g olive oil and add 50g peeled and sliced garlic loves, 50g diced red onion, 50g diced white onion, 50g diced celery, 7.5g red chilli and 7.5g green chilli and cook on a medium hear for five to eight minutes. Then add 18g ground turmeric and cook for another two minutes. Then add 350g coconut milk and pieces and 150g coconut cream and simmer. Add 200g sliced sweet potatoes, 100g diced courgettes, 40g of red, yellow and green pepper respectively, and cook for 15 minutes.

Finally, add 40g clear honey, 75g cherry tomatoes, 50g chorizo sausage pieces and 50g fresh coriander and simmer. Take off the heat and rest for 10 minutes.

Place the stew in a warmed soup plate, place the chicken breast on pot and add a coriander dressing (made from coriander leaves, clear honey, olive oil, garcil cloves, lime juice, rock salt and cracked black pepper). To garnish, serve with roasted tomatoes on the vine and fresh lime.

''After completing a four-year apprenticeship with Sheraton Hotels in London, Chris worked for several major hotel companies in the 1980s, before spending eight years working on a freelance basis as a 'head chef and trouble shooter' in the 1990s. In 1999, he was approached by Grampian Country Food Group to work in its chicken division as a development chef. He then moved on to Grampian's pork division. After a year, he moved on to RF Brookes, where he worked on Marks & Spencer's American, Count on Us and fully cooked sandwich meats ranges.

His latest role is innovation and development chef at Sun Valley Foods.

Chris is a member of the Development Chefs' Network.''

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