Chicken with Leek and Spinach
Ingredients
- Chicken
- spinach
- Leek
Instructions
- m not a gardener by any stretch and pull of the laziest of imaginations, but I could pretend to be if I zoomed in on one blossoming bunch of spinach in my garden and ignored the snail chewed leaves of the rest of them. I'm getting better at it, but I've a long way to go. I like to plant what's already been started by someone else with a more nurturing green thumb or two. I then take the hopeful little seedlings, Brian blesses them and I repot them into my vegetable patch. There's a collective holding of breath, while I check up on them from time to time. I've been excited beyond imagining harvesting 1 single cabbage only to return days later to the decimated remains of worm infested yellow cabbage leaves and green cabbage bloated worms. I've vowed never to plant them again because I felt so utterly defeated. I just can't bring myself to spraying poison on the food I want to enjoy. So I plough on in the hope of a harvest. This season I planted more spinach, spring onion, leaks, and herbs, herbs and more herbs. This evening I decided to pull up a spring onion and a leak. I was intrigued to see what was going on beneath the soil surface. I was relieved to see they looked perfectly healthy covered in dark, rich soil with the hairy roots still attached. I cut that part off and washed away the earth and placed them proudly on my chopping block in my kitchen. I scrounged around looking to see what else could go into creating dinner for 2 tonight. I found 4 potatoes and one sweet potato and a bunch of store bought spring onions. Garlic is a must to pack in more flavour. I splashed olive oil into a pan and I finely chopped all the ingredients. Into the pan they went along with salt pepper a vegetable stock sachet. This was fried for about 5 min. I then covered them all with milk a gentle simmered for about 30min.
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- I had 6 deboned chicken thighs that I seasoned with olive oil, Nigella seeds, a shake or 3 of chilli flakes, ground coriander, ground cumin and Portuguese chicken spice. I bloomed the spices in a pan to bring out their flavours then added them to the olive oil which then coated the thighs. I let that sit and marinade for 30 min. Once the leeks and potatoes were soft I blitzed them with a stick blender. I checked the salt and pepper and added more for taste. There is definitely something magical about leeks and potatoes.
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- The texture was thick and creamy. I decided to keep it like that, rather than add more milk to thin it down. Back out into my garden with a torch now. I snipped fresh rocket and parsley. Into water and a quick spin and they were ready for plating. I needed crunch!!! Mmm I sliced and cubed Sourdough bread which I baked yesterday. I tossed them into a hot pan drizzled with olive oil. I tipped them onto a paper towel to crisp and wait for plating. I used the same hot pan and added the thighs. 3-4 mins on Both sides and they were done.
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- Tear the leaves and place at the bottom of a deep pasta bowl. Place 2 thighs on top, scatter the Sourdough croutons around the chicken. Gently pour the leek and potato "soup" around the chicken. Sprinkle with toasted pumpkin seeds (I have these ready in the fridge for salads and stuff) drizzle with more olive oil and serve with a nice glass of chilled Chardonnay.
Please let me know how it turned out for you! Leave a comment below!