I dreamt this dish up an aeon ago, but my lazy sorry arse has only just got round to typing it up. I created it for a royal occasion for which we were having a dinner to celebrate and there’s nothing better no more British than Coronation Chicken.
Coronation Chicken was the brainchild of Constance Spry, a food writer and Rosemary Hume, a chef from the Cordon Bleu Cookery School in London. They conjured it up for a banquet to celebrate the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth in 1953.
Their recipe is for a cold dish – basically chicken, curry and mayonnaise… Mine marries it with the traditional roast and minuses the mayonnaise. The creaminess comes with the sauce.
Music to prepare this dish to: ‘Killer Queen’ by Queen
Ingredients
- I medium chicken
- 2oz Sultanas
- One huge glug white wine
- 3oz salted butter
- 3 heaped teaspoons mild curry powder
- Dijon mustard
- Salt and pepper
- Zest and juice of one lime
- Toasted flaked almonds
- A few stems of coriander, chopped
Method
- Heat oven to 180 degrees.
- Bring wine to the boil, remove from the heat and throw in the sultanas. Let them steep in the wine for a good 10 mins until the wine is cool.
- Cream the curry powder and butter until evenly mixed.
- Pinch the skin of the chicken until it is loosened and spread the butter between the skin and the breast meat (see pic below). If there’s any left-over butter (there really shouldn’t be), add it into the cavity of the chicken.
- Smother the chicken in Dijon mustard and season with salt and pepper.
- Baste every 30 minutes and cook for around 1hr 35mins (the size of your chook will determine how long it needs cooking for).
- Once cooked, remove the chicken and let it rest for 15 mins.
- While it’s resting, use the chicken juices and the wine from the sultanas to create a gravy. Thicken with flour if necessary but ensure you cook it out. To add extra richness you can add a dash of double cream. A little of this sauce goes a long long way.
- Carve the chicken with scissors; two legs, two wings and ensure you cut each breast in two .
- Arrange in a dish and scatter over the wine-soaked sultanas, almond flakes and lime zest.
- Squeeze the lime juice over the chicken and finish off with the finely chopped coriander.
- Serve with the gravy.
This goes lovely with an old world Falerio to enhance the buttery goodness of the chicken.
Pug's Kitchen 