Baked Chicken with Artichokes and Capers Recipe

Something tells me that you organized cooks out there are in the midst of planning your Easter and Passover menus.  Am I right?  My mom had me on the phone the other day trying to get side dish suggestions for her traditional Easter leg of lamb.  After I spoke with her, I took a call from my mother-in-law to go over her Passover menu.  This year we’ll be staying in California for the holidays and I’m on dessert duty.  I’ll be making lots of coconut macaroons, my traditional lemon ice torte and a raw cashew cheesecake that I’m obsessed with.  But if I were hosting Easter or Passover at my home (not that there’s anything wrong with lamb and brisket), I would make this Baked Chicken with Artichokes and Capers.

Normally, I don’t post a recipe until after I have finished teaching it, but I am just so excited about this chicken I can’t wait another day.  It might be my favorite chicken recipe to date, which says a lot since I prepare chicken quite often.  This dish has it all — great flavor, ease of preparation, healthfulness and seasonality.    But really chicken isn’t even the star of this show.  I actually came up with this recipe to work around one of my favorite springtime vegetables, artichokes.

I am going to cheat a little here.  There are times when DIY is the way to go, as in chicken stock.  And there are times when there is not enough patience in the world that could get me through trimming the number of artichokes it would take to fill this saute pan.  (Although I am the same person that trimmed 10 pounds of Brussels sprout leaves for Christmas Eve dinner.)  What’s different about this situation is that Trader Joe’s has come to my rescue with frozen artichoke hearts, an absolute gift and an affordable one, too.   Not only do I always have a bag in my freezer at all times, but the other ingredients here are pantry staples, too — capers, white wine, bay leaves, mustard, which are all delicious with artichokes.

You may have followed similar recipes for chicken and dredged the chicken in flour first before browning it.  The flour does help to the thicken the sauce a bit, but we can avoid the dredging altogether by adding the mustard to the sauce, which gives great flavor, as well as some body.  Be sure to read my latest post on the secret to great-tasting chicken and you can decide if you want to salt the pieces or soak them in a wet brine.  Both ways are very easy and definitely worth doing.  Please note in that post that kosher chicken should not be salted or brined since it has already gone through a salting process.  To make this recipe with boneless, skinless pieces, check out my recipe for Lemon-Thyme Chicken and follow those steps.

For a winner spring holiday lunch or dinner, pair this chicken with this asparagus salad or minted sugar snap peas, and some roasted new potatoes.  I have a seriously fabulous vegan and gluten-free coconut tart coming your way soon!

Baked Chicken with Artichokes and Capers

Pamela
5 from 1 vote
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Servings 4 -6

Ingredients
  

  • Brine: do not brine kosher chicken
  • 1 cup hot water
  • ¼ cup kosher salt
  • 1 cup ice water
  • 3 pounds bone-in skin-on chicken pieces
  • 2 Tablespoons unrefined olive oil or coconut oil
  • 1 medium onion diced or sliced (as you prefer)
  • 3 cloves garlic cloves sliced
  • a big pinch of sea salt or more if using unsalted stock
  • Freshly ground black pepper to taste
  • 1/3 cup dry white wine
  • 2 bay leaves don’t worry if you don’t have them
  • 12 ounce bag frozen artichoke hearts or packed in water
  • 2 Tablespoons capers
  • 2 Tablespoons whole grain or stone ground mustard
  • ¾ cup chicken stock preferably homemade
  • Chopped fresh parsley for garnish optional

Instructions
 

  • In a large bowl, dissolve salt in hot water. Add ice water and check to make sure brine is cool. Add chicken to brine and allow to soak for 45 minutes, and up to an hour and a half. OR sprinkle ½ Tablespoon of kosher salt on the chicken when you get home from the market. Rewrap it and refrigerate it until ready to cook. (Do not brine kosher chicken.)
  • Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Remove chicken from brine and pat dry with paper towels.
  • In an ovenproof skillet or braising pan, over medium heat, add the oil. Brown chicken on both sides. Transfer to a plate and reserve.
  • Add onions to skillet and cook until tender, about 8 minutes. Add garlic, salt and pepper and sauté another minute or two. Carefully add wine to pan, and deglaze by scraping any brown bits on the bottom.
  • Add chicken, bay leaves, artichoke hearts, capers, mustard and stock to pan and bring to a boil. Place in oven for 30-35 minutes, until chicken is cooked through, basting after 15 minutes. Garnish with fresh chopped parsley, if available.
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!

 

 

Spinach Risotto Healthy Recipe

Spinach Risotto Recipe

I had a bad day recently and what I really wanted to do was inhale a pan of brownies, but I had just published a post about how I beat a sugar addiction and I didn’t want to be a healthy hypocrite.  Instead I set out to make a pot of spinach risotto, my culinary equivalent to a big hug.   If you’re not a spinach fan, I’m not going to be much fun for you this week and next.  We are on the verge of spring, Nature’s new year.  I really feel the resurgence of energy and life that comes back in spring and I get so motivated to start fresh, clean a closet, reorganize a drawer, set some healthful resolutions.  Nutritionally speaking, Nature wants us to start fresh, too, so she gives us lots of dark leafy greens like spinach.  If winter added a few pounds or you have a build-up of mucus or stagnant energy, leafy greens can help.  You already know that greens are super nutrient-dense, but it’s all that chlorophyll that helps the liver to detoxify.  Now if you’re in a habit of eating seasonally, you don’t even need to know this since you would make it happen naturally.

Spinach

As I mentioned in my Spinach and Avocado Smoothie recipe, you have a fantastic window of opportunity with St. Patrick’s Day coming up to make green food.  So I thought today would be a great time to post this spinach risotto recipe.  Please don’t get put off by the word “risotto.”  It doesn’t imply something hard to make, easy to screw up or super labor intensive.  In fact, risotto is something I make when I don’t have a lot of time or I need to make do with bits of this or that in the fridge.  This time around I was overzealous  with my purchase of spinach and wanted to find a good place for it.

Most people think making risotto requires a permanent spot in front of the stove and non-stop stirring.  Not so.  You do have to add a bit of broth to the pot every five minutes and give a quick stir, but you can be accomplishing other things at the same time, such as testing someone on his spelling words, prepping some vegetables, or breaking up an argument between two teenage girls over borrowing clothes.  If you don’t have the patience to be in the presence of teenage girls in the kitchen for too long to stir traditional risotto every five minutes, check out my very easy Artichoke and Spinach Barley Risotto — saute, dump and bake.  Otherwise, timing is the only tricky part since you want to serve risotto as soon as it’s done.  My first round of photos didn’t turn out all that great, so I reshot the plate about 15 minutes later and the risotto had already lost its lovely soupiness and thickened up.  Not the end of the world, of course, but I prefer risotto a little more “pourable.”

Risotto is often served as a first course for dinner, but we’re not in a habit of eating dinner in courses at our house, are you?  So I serve it as a side with other dishes that are a little lighter.  The night I photographed this, I served it with roasted shrimp and a green salad.  I very often serve fish with risotto, such as spice-rubbed or poached salmon with a fresh tomato salsa.  Steamed asparagus, roasted carrots or a grated carrot salad would also complement nicely.  If you do think you will serve this as part of a St. Patrick’s Day dinner, why not give everybody a jump start on spring cleaning and serve everything green?  Enjoy!

Spinach Risotto Recipe

Spinach Risotto

Pamela
5 from 2 votes
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Servings 6 as a side dish

Ingredients
  

  • 12 ounces spinach leaves washed
  • 3 ½ - 4 cups chicken or vegetable stock preferably homemade
  • 2 Tablespoons unrefined cold pressed, extra virgin olive oil or unsalted butter
  • 1 medium onion diced
  • 3 cloves garlic finely chopped
  • 1 ½ cups Arborio rice do NOT rinse
  • ½ cup dry white wine
  • 1 teaspoon fine grain sea salt
  • zest of 1 lemon
  • 1/3 cup grated Parmesan or Pecorino-Romano cheese

Instructions
 

  • In a wide saucepan you will use for the risotto, bring ½ an inch of water to a boil. Add the spinach leaves and cover. Steam for one minute. Stir the spinach and continue to steam until just wilted.
  • Transfer the spinach to a blender (I pull the spinach out with tongs) and discard the cooking liquid. Puree the spinach and set aside.
  • In a medium saucepan, bring all the stock to a boil and turn off the heat. In the same saucepan that the spinach was cooked in, warm the olive oil over medium heat. Add the onion and sauté gently until tender and translucent, about 3-4 minutes. Add the garlic and sauté for another minute or two.
  • Add the rice to the onions and stir to coat with the oil. Set your timer for 20 minutes. Sauté rice for 2 minutes. Pour the wine into the saucepan and stir occasionally until it has been absorbed.
  • Add the salt, zest, and 1 cup of the warmed stock and bring to a lively simmer. The pot should be simmering with active, not furious bubbles. Once the stock has almost been fully absorbed, add another ladleful or about ½ cup and stir occasionally.
  • After 20 minutes, taste the rice for doneness. Ideally, it is still al dente.
  • Stir in the cheese and spinach puree. Give the risotto a nice, brisk stir. Turn off the heat and allow to sit for 5 minutes. It should be loose and almost soupy. Serve immediately.
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!