hamlyn illustration all colour cookbook

200

Fast chicken dishes

contents

introduction

snacks & light bites

healthy feasts

hot & spicy

family favourites

food for friends

index

acknowledgements

How to use this ebook

Select one of the chapters from the main contents list and you will be taken to a list of all the recipes covered in that chapter.

Alternatively, jump to the index to browse recipes by ingredient.

Look out for linked text (which is underlined and/or in a different colour) throughout the ebook that you can select to help you navigate between related recipes.

introduction

This book offers a new and flexible approach to meal-planning for busy cooks and lets you choose the recipe option that best fits the time you have available. Inside you will find 200 dishes that will inspire you and motivate you to get cooking every day of the year.

All the recipes take a maximum of 30 minutes to cook. Some take as little as 20 minutes and, amazingly, many take only 10 minutes.

On every page you’ll find a main recipe plus a short-cut version or a fancier variation if you have a bit more time to spare. Whatever you go for, you’ll find a huge range of super-quick recipes to get you through the week.

chicken dishes

Chicken is inexpensive, quick to cook and hugely versatile, and its mild flavour makes it a favourite with people of every age. The unending appeal of chicken as a source of protein lies in its mild flavour, which lends itself to being blended with a host of different ingredients, from the delicate tastes of Mediterranean foods, such as basil and olives, to the rich, heavily spiced stews and curries of India. This is why we find chicken in so many recipes from around the globe, and why we have been able to include so many exciting and different recipes in this book. Think of chicken as a blank canvas to which you can add your favourite flavours. Chicken works with almost every style of cooking: Asian-style stir-fries; garlicky or herby grilled dishes; richly spiced curries; warm and cold salads; fragrant Thai coconut recipes; classic coq au vin and other wine-based stews; simple pasta dishes – the opportunities for your evening meal are almost endless.

tips and techniques

There a few simple cooking aids that really can have an amazing effect on the time spent in the kitchen.

• A food processor and a mini chopper are great time-savers.

• A good vegetable peeler, garlic peeler and crusher are all great, simple little gadgets to help save time on fiddly jobs.

• Good, sharp knives make food preparation simpler and faster.

• Try cooking large amounts and then freezing in portions. This way, you’ll always have a fast, ready-made, low-effort meal at your fingertips.

• Preparing ingredients in advance will save time when you come to cook the meal later on. Peel and chop vegetables, for example, then keep them refrigerated in freezer bags until you need them.

a speedy food

Chicken appeals to cooks for many reasons, not least because it freezes exceptionally well (a chicken can be frozen with no effect on its flavour or texture for up to two years). But its unending value as an ingredient in so many dishes can be found in the speed with which it can be cooked.

A whole bird, no matter how small, cannot be cooked in less than an hour of course, but you should be able to cook the individual parts of the chicken – a wing, a leg, a thigh or a breast – within 30 minutes. When you are buying thighs, it can be worth paying a little bit more to get them already deboned, so that you can flatten the meat or cut the flesh into chunks and thereby speed up the cooking process. If the recipe requires that you keep the thighs whole, try to buy smaller thighs, because the larger they are, the longer they will take to cook. If small or boneless thighs are unavailable, you can speed up the cooking process by making a few fairly deep cuts into the surface of the meat. The same is true with chicken breast: flatten or score the meat and it will cook much quicker.

When preparing recipes that call for small pieces of chicken breast, many people choose to use mini-fillets. These tend to be extremely tender and incredibly easy to cook, so they may be worth the extra money.

With the growth in demand for ready-prepared foods, you can now find chicken in a host of different flavours. If you look in a delicatessen or the cooked meat aisle of a supermarket, you can find smoked chicken breast, which is wonderful in salads and on pizzas, Tikka-flavoured cooked chicken pieces, which are excellent in sandwiches, and other interesting flavours, including Chinese chicken, barbecue-flavoured chicken and Cajun chicken.

a healthy choice

Another reason why chicken breast is such a popular choice these days is that it contains little fat. Steamed or grilled chicken breast is one of the leanest, healthiest meats available, and even stir-fried chicken can be low in fat, as long as you are careful about the amount of oil you put in the pan. The key to a successful low-fat diet is to mix up the flavours in your meals so that you never get bored: expand your repertoire and try out some new recipes.

Although chicken wings technically qualify as white meat as well, you should be aware that they are also the fattiest part of the bird. Be careful when you are barbecuing wings: they are prone to flare up because of the amount of fat that comes out when they cook. Chicken thighs and legs are still lean meat compared to meats such as beef and lamb, however. If you are watching your calorific intake, always make sure to remove the chicken skin, as the majority of the fat is stored just under the skin.

great for family and friends

It seems that everybody likes chicken. When you are entertaining a large number of guests, you can almost guarantee that a chicken dish will be particularly well received. Similarly, when you are cooking for a roomful of youngsters, be they three or thirteen years old, chicken recipes will usually go down well with even the fussiest of young diners. So defrost those chicken pieces you’ve got in the freezer, choose one of our gorgeous recipes and dish up a delicious feast for your family and friends in next to no time at all. No matter which recipe you choose from this book today, it is bound to be a sure-fire winner.