Middle Eastern Inspired Roast Chicken with Fully loaded cous cous and home made flat bread.

I’m a huge fan or Middle Eastern food and flavours, I am also a huge fan of good quality roast chicken. The seasoning for the meat takes some of the flavours from a pretty awesome Jamie Oliver recipe that he used on tray baked lamb.  The carrot and orange salad is the same as the recipe in the Jamie Does book although I’ve omitted the pomegranate as they shop didn’t have any.

I rubbed the chicken with all of the spices on the morning before I cooked it just so they had extra time to get into the meat.

For the flat bread which is based on a lavash, I used my pizza stone, if you haven’t got one just use a large baking tray.

For the Cous Cous I used about 50g per person, you can of course use a lot more if you wish. I also used a roughly 2 parts water or stock to 1 part cous cous theory although I just tipped the water in until I thought it was wet enough. The rest of the ingredients for the cous cous were just what I thought looked enough.

The chicken takes the longest but you can always prepare everything in advance.

Ingredients

For the chicken

• 1 Free Range Corn Fed Chicken.
• Salt
• Pepper
• 1 tsp rosemary
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 1 tsp ground corriander
• 1/2 tsp tumeric
• 1 tsp thyme
• 3 cloves of garlic
• pinch of paprika
• pinch of chilli powder
• Olive oil
• 1 Lemon

For the bread (makes 5)

• 140g Strong white bread flour
• 90g strong whole meal bread flour
• 2 tablespoons natural or greek yoghurt
• pinch of salt
• 125ml warm water
• 7g yeast

For the Carrot and orange Salad

• 4 Carrots
• juice of half an orange
• fresh mint leaves
• red wine vinegar
• salt
• pepper
• olive oil

For the Fully Loaded Cous Cous

• Cous Cous
• Boiling Chicken Stock or boiling water.
• A few dried apricots, finely diced
• A few dried dates, finely diced
• 1/2 packet of dried mushrooms.
• 1/2 green pepper, finely diced
• 1/2 red pepper, finely diced
• 1 small red onion, finely diced
• 1 tsp Harissa
• small handful of flat leaf parsley, chopped
• 1/2 tsp dried mint.

Other bits

• Jar of Harissa
• Natural or Greek yoghurt.

Method

For the chicken

1. Mix the herbs and spices together with the crushed garlic, season with salt and pepper
2. Cut any string off your chicken, trim any excess fat off and then rub with olive oil, rub the whole chicken with the spice mix and leave to marinade in the fridge for as long as possible.
3. Remove the chicken from the fridge 30mins before you want to cook.
4. Pre heat your oven to 200 degrees C.
5. Cook your chicken for 1.5-3 hours depending on the size. When it’s done it the legs should pull off very easily.
6. Place on a board and cover with tin foil and a tea towel before serving.

For the Cous Cous

1. Place the cous cous in a bowl along with all of the ingredients, cover with the boiling water or stock
2. Mix well
3. Cover the bowl with cling film and set aside for 10minutes

For the Flat Bread

• Sieve the flour’s into a big bowl
• Mix the yeast with the warm water.
• Add the salt to the flour followed by the yoghurt
• Add the water and mix well with a spoon on your hands.
• Knead for 8-10minutes until the dough is smooth and elastic y.
• Cover the bowl with cling film and put in a warm place for an hour or so until the dough has doubled in size.
• Place a baking tray in the oven so it gets really hot (if you are using a pizza stone, follow the instructions for heating that up)
• Remove the dough from the bowl and place on a floured work surface, knock the air out and divide it into 5 balls.
• Roll out each ball so it is really thin, stretch it using your hands if need be.
• Drop one of the flatbreads onto the baking tray and cook for 6-8 minutes until its nice and crispy, place on a wire rack to cool, repeat for the other 4 breads.

For the Carrot and Orange salad

• Peel the carrots then cut or peel the carrots into matchsticks, ribbons or julienne and place in a bowl.
• Season with salt and pepper.
• add a splash of olive oil and red wine vinegar followed by the orange juice.
• add the mint and mix well.

To Serve

The best way to serve it is on a big board in the centre of the table and just let everyone tuck in, failing that just carve the chicken up, plate up with a flat bread, some cous cous, some carrot and orange salad, a dollop of yoghurt and a couple of spoons of harissa. eat with your fingers