Moroccan meat dish with dried prune

Moroccan Chicken Tagine with green olives recipe

What is a Tagine?

 Tagine is an authentic and famous Moroccan dish that is an excellent meal to eat with family or with guests. It can be prepared with beef, lamb, chicken, fish or only with different vegetables. Tagine can refer to the clay pot in which you can easily cook food as well as it is a name of the dishes we prepare in as we said before with meat or fish or vegetables only. 

In this blog, we will prepare chicken Tagine with green olives in tagine pot and you may have a look at fish tagine if you want to make it instead of the chicken tagine. However, if you don`t have the tagine pot you can cook in a regular cooking pan and you can.

• Preparation: 30 min

• Cooking: 1 h 15 min

• 4 to 6 portions

• Origin: Morocco

Chicken Tagine recipe.

What are the ingredients for the chicken Tagine?

• 1.5 kg pieces of skinless chicken  (drumstick, thigh, breast).

• 1 large chopped onion.

• 4 minced cloves of garlic.

• A bunch of parsley and cilantro, chopped finely.

• 80 g of green olives.

• Half of  preserved lemon.

• 30 ml (2 tbsp.) Vegetable oil.

• 30 ml (2 tbsp.) olive oil.

• 1 tbsp Turmeric.

• 1 pinch of saffron.

• Salt not so much (note we have preserved lemon and olive which have salt).

• 1 tsp pepper not full.

• 1 tbsp Fresh ginger, chopped.

• 200 ml water, approximately, if using a tagine.

How to prepare the tagine step by step?

 

Now we begin the preparation of our tagine and you have to follow the same steps to have the best results.

• First, clean the chicken with salt and fresh lemon juice and try to rub well the meat with it and leave it for 2 hours it`s better if you do this step one night before. Then wash the chicken with water and put it aside.

• Then take a tagine or a regular cooking pan and put in the chicken. Add the chopped onion, garlic, parsley and cilantro, vegetable and olive oil, salt (not so much because we have the preserved lemon and olives salted), pepper, ginger, turmeric, saffron and stir the ingredients with the chicken until they all mix together. You'll get more flavor if you marinate the chicken with spices two or three hours before. 

• Add the olives and the preserved lemons, then cover and place the tagine on a slow heat for 10 minutes then add enough water to cook the chicken for 45 minutes, but if you are using a cooking pan, cook it for 30 minutes, and add water from time to time as needed.

• You have to know that the cooking time and water may vary depending on the size of your chicken. 

• 5 minutes before you turn off your heat make sure that you have enough sauce and salt to taste.

• Turn off the heat, and let the tagine cool for about 5 to 10 minutes before serving. 

How to serve the tagine?

• Put the chicken and the sauce in your serving dish if you cook it in a regular pan or serve the tagine as it is and if you want you can serve it with French fries on the top and eat it with the Moroccan homemade bread.

 Enjoy your tagine with your family or friends.

Good Appetite 😀