My nephew had given me a tube of Harissa awhile back, and has asked me a few times if I had tried it yet. I can finally say yes!
I saw this recipe in the October 2017 issue of Cooking Light and decided to try it out this morning.
http://www.cookinglight.com/recipes/chicken-thighs-harissa-vegetables
I had everything but potatoes, but I have been restricting carbs so made it without potatoes.
Yes that is an original Rival Crockpot. It was a wedding gift and is over 34 years old.
I started by peeling and cutting the onions in 8ths as directed, leaving the root end intact so it had a bit of the look of a blooming onion. I'm sure the onion added a lot of flavor, but to eat it had an oddly sour taste. I might actually use a white onion if I make it again. I’ll have to think about it.
I also cut the carrots into 2 inch round diagonals. They may have been closer to 3. They came out perfectly but I don’t think I would do smaller carrots or cut them smaller. They were pretty much the perfect consistency, and any smaller I think they would have slipped over to mushy.
The recipe called for 1/4 cup of harissa paste and 1 tablespoon of oil to go into the crockpot and stir together. Although it gave wonderful flavor to the vegetables, if you got a taste of the sauce along it was really hot (and I like heat). I’m not sure if the answer is to use less, or temper it somehow. I’d like to keep the flavor and reduce the heat.
Now it was time to brown the chicken thighs. First up was to create the spice blend for coating the chicken. 1 teaspoon each of garlic powder, black pepper, and smoky Spanish paprika, and 1/4 tsp kosher salt. The smoked Spanish paprika from Savory Spice Shop is absolutely incredible so I was happy to be using it here.
Next I peeled off the skin from some bone in chicken thighs. Luckily I remembered in time to leave aside five of them so I could fry for Steve for dinner. If this dish was hot for me, it would be an inferno for him so I’m glad I set them aside! Then I coated them with the spice blend.
I browned them meaty side down for 5 minutes (per the recipe of course!).
While they were cooking, I added the carrots and onion to the mixture in the crock pot and tossed to coat.
I found it interesting that the recipes calls for browning only on the one side, but I obeyed, and after browning them I place the chicken thighs browned side up on top of the vegetables.
And cooked them in the Crockpot for 8 hours, on low. I have to admit it was pretty nice to come upstairs after work and have dinner basically be done. I don’t use my crockpot that much, and I should! The instructions are to remove the chicken, then add the remaining 3/4 tsp of kosher salt to the vegetables and toss. I obeyed, and neither found the dish to salty or felt I needed to add salt. It was pretty much perfect on the salt scale.
It did make a pretty serving plate, and smelled great!
The recipe calls for putting the vegetables in a bowl, then placing the chicken on top and ladling a little of the juices from the crockpot over them and squeezing a bit of lemon juice over them.
The lemon juice definitely added something. But, that sauce was ungodly hot. The harissa really gave the vegetables nice flavor, but the salt on its own is just too much. Serving it without the sauce was fine, the harissa had done its work flavoring the carrot and onion. However, I have poured it into a bowl and put in the fridge, and tomorrow I might play with either adding a little yogurt or a little sour cream, and see if that elevates the sauce some.
I would also say that I liked the method they used here. In the magazine, they present it as solving the problem of meals in a slower cooker that basically become soup. Buy placing the chicken above the vegetables, the fat from the chicken basically coats the vegetables, and the chicken itself stays nice and crispy. You’ll notice that there is no liquid added to this recipe. Be sure to click on the Cooking Light link to check it out (or copy and paste).
Labels: Main Dish