Chicken breast with creamy Chickpeas

I was asked to provide recipe to one of the dishes I posted on Instagram, so here you go. 🙂

Chicken breast marinade

Start with “butterflying” chicken breasts as seen on the picture bellow:

Amount of marinade for 4 chicken breasts.

Take out your pestle & mortar and start preparing marinade by crushing following ingredients into smooth paste:

• 1 flat tea spoon of black pepper
• 1 flat tea spoon of roman cumin
• 1 flat tea spoon of coriander
• 5 birds eye chilly peppers (adjust to taste)
• 3 tea spoons of lemon juice
• 1 spoon of good olive oil
• 1 tea spoon of brown sugar
• 1 clove of garlic
• pinch of sea salt (little bit will not extract juices from the meat, rather cure it and make it more tender)

After all of the ingredients are turned into paste, use brush to apply marinade to your chicken. Put the chicken into container, cover with clean film and let sit in the fridge at least for 8 hours, ideally for up to 24 hours.

Pan-frying or BBQ chicken breasts

!!!! Prior to pan frying/bbq, take the chicken out from the fridge for at least one hour to bring the meat up to room temperature. This will allow better temperature penetration, prevent loss of juices and keep the meat succulent.

Before frying or BBQ, sprinkle coarse salt over the meat and fry/BBQ over high heat for 2,5 minutes per side.

IMPORTANT NOTE: After frying/BBQ the meat, let it rest for at least 5 minutes to let it absorb the juices back, this will make meat much more juicy and tastier. 🙂 This works with all meats.

Creamy Chickpeas

Ingredients:

• 250 grams of chickpeas
• 500 ml of vegetable stock
• 100 ml of white wine (dry)
• 2 birds eye chilly peppers
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 1 medium size shallot
• 10 cherry tomatoes
• 1 spoon of olive oil
• 1 tea spoon of fine flour
• 1 tea spoon of butter
• Spring onions for garnish.

1. Let 250 grams of chickpeas soak overnight in water.
2. Cook chickpeas in vegetable stock, with 2 cloves of garlic and 2 birds eye chilly peppers for one hour at low heat covered.
3. Drain the chickpeas, but save the fluid.
4. In separate pan, fry shallot on low heat for couple of minutes, but do not let it turn too brown.
5. Add diced tomatoes and white wine, let reduce for couple of minutes (let 2/3 of the fluid to evaporate).
6. In another pan, melt butter, add fine flour and cook off for 3-5 minutes while making sure you move the mixture around. Start slowly adding left over fluid from cooking chickpeas – mix fast to create smooth, thick sauce.
7. Add chickpeas and thick sauce into the pan with shallot, tomatoes and wine. Let boil for minute or two, set aside.

Plating & Serving

After chickpeas are done, spread them over plate and sprinkle with finely chopped spring onions. Take rested chicken breasts and ad to the plate and ENJOY! 🙂