Moroccan Tagine

Sassy Syrah's Note:

This is a real comfort dish, don't be put off by the sweet and savoury combination, it works really well. If you have a tagine, you could use it for the recipe, I however do not. Serve over couscous.

• Total Time: 50 mins
• Prep Time: 10 mins
• Cook Time: 40 mins

Ingredients:

Servings: 4

• 2 teaspoons vegetable oil
• 2 cups chopped onions
• 2 garlic cloves , crushed
• 2 boneless skinless chicken breasts , diced 1/2 cm cubes
• 1 cup carrot , sliced 1/2 cm thick
• 1 large red capsicums (also known as a bell pepper) or 1 large green capsicum , cut into strips (also known as a bell pepper)
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• ½ teaspoon ground allspice
• ½ teaspoon ground ginger
• ½ teaspoon turmeric
• ¼ teaspoon cinnamon
• ¼ teaspoon salt
• ¼ teaspoon cayenne
• 1 cup water
• 1 medium eggplant , cut into 1 cm cubes
• ½ cup raisins (I have substituted sultanas)
• 1 (400 g) can chickpeas , drained and rinsed (I understand these are called garbanzo beans in other places)
• ½ cup dried apricot (optional)

Directions:

1. Heat oil in a saucepan over medium heat.
2. Add the onion and garlic, stirring for a few minutes until onion is translucent.
3. Add chicken and lightly colour, stirring. Remove from pan.
4. Add carrots, capsicum, and spices.
5. Stir dry to toast.
6. Once a nice aroma comes from the pan, add 1/2 cup of water.
7. Cook stirring occasionally for 5 minutes.
8. Add remaining ingredients.
9. Cover and simmer over a medium heat for 30 minutes until veggies are tender.
10. Stir frequently during cooking, to prevent catching on the bottom.
11. You may need to add additional water.
12. Serve with couscous.
13. NB: You only need to salt your eggplant if there are lots of black seeds when you cut it open.
14. Make sure you rinse the excess salt off and dry well in that case.

Reviews

[Rita~]

The sweet and savoury combination works great! But there are a couple of problems with the recipe. First adding carrots, capsicum, and spices then stirring to dry to toast is really hard because of the moisture in the chicken, onions and peppers. Then the cooking time of the diced chicken tend to over cook it.I think instead of 30 minutes over medium heat 10 minutes simmered would be just fine. I didn`t do the eggplant but if I was to do it I would brown them in hot oil first. I served this over brown rice. I enjoyed this except for the chicken be dry. By the way diced chicken in how small of a dice? The vegies were very tender. Lots of flavor. I will make this again but I will saute the chicken remove it saute the vegies then add back the chicken. I think even using the spices as a dry rub before frying would be great.I would like to give this a 5 if just the chicken were more tender. Thanks for posting this recipe.

[Shelly K]

What a great healthy recipe. I found out that capsicum means pepper in American. Apparently I'm dyslexic because I could have sworn I read "red capsicum" Even with the wrong type, it was awesome and I thought the red pepper added a nice color to it.

[DaddyO']

So my wife really didn't care for this dish, but I absolutely loved it... I guess it goes on the "list to make when mom's away". The fruit and zip mixed just right and everything turned out great. In the directions it talks about "a good aroma comes from the pan", you'll know when it's time - the aroma is awesome!