Last update - 00:00 11/10/2006
My Private Chef / Tastes like chicken
By Miri Hanoch and Eyal Shani
While I ate a white roll with yellow cheese and butter, the skinny chef sat next to me; with a head shorn of curls, he devoured his Kellogg's Special K with 1 percent milk and a 100 percent look of righteousness in his eyes.
"It's a shame that you don't start the day with this; it would change your whole day," he told me, while I bite into my roll, saying nothing, with a defiant look, as though the Israeli representative of Kellogg's were sitting opposite me.
As the day continued, I did in fact continually sniff out carbohydrates and sugars, while he ate oranges with a smell of winter, whistled to himself and, in a holiday mood, hopped over to the butcher shop to buy something for the last days of the Sukkot holiday, Hoshana Rabba and Shemini Atzeret, which finally conclude the chain of start-of-the-year holidays. No more until Hanukkah.
The next day he managed to surprise me, although we've known each other for a while, because he is usually not a big fan of chicken. "It's institutional food," he always says dryly. He is not moved by my populist explanations to the effect that chicken is what most non-vegetarians eat, most of the time. This morning he smiled a small, mysterious smile. "I brought you a roll from the grocery, would you like it?" I turned around to him, astonished. "You brought me a roll?"
"Yes," he continued, enjoying his game.
"I actually don't feel like having a roll this morning," I replied, cautious because of a hidden sense that a trap was being set.
It was already midday, and our plan to get to the sukkah in the desert would not be implemented if we didn't get on our way early.
He continued to hum contentedly, and I discovered that my roll, that tasty cache of empty calories, had disappeared. There was no chance that he'd eaten it, because for him it's the epitome of sin, and the girls, who might be interested in eating a roll, weren't home.
I brought the little one back from kindergarten on a tricycle, which has become her official vehicle since Yom Kippur. She refuses to go on foot and is certainly no longer willing to submit to the humiliation of being pushed in a stroller. She rides the tricycle straight and fast, but while she has learned the art of fast riding, she has never experienced the art of stopping before a road or on a steep slope.
"I'm making you a surprise for the holiday," said the chef as we entered the house, running to the oven as though he had a secret home there.
Three hours later, everyone asked, "When are we going, or what are we actually eating?"
"It's a secret," replied the chef.
"Great that it's a secret," said the eldest, "but when are we eating it?" because during adolescence it matters less what we eat, the emphasis is on when we eat whatever it is.
The middle child understood that she shouldn't start up with any of us, closed the door and retreated into her own world, and the little one continued to pedal, wearing a bicycle helmet, through the corridors of the house, encountering a different obstacle each time, crashing onto the floor and repeatedly proving the effectiveness of the helmet even during very short trips.
Only in the afternoon, when we hadn't moved even one centimeter in the direction of the desert, did he stand over a baking pan with something that looked simply like roast chicken.
"Nu, what's the big secret here, wow, roast chicken," hissed the eldest, who up to then had already managed to eat a bowl of sweetened breakfast cereal, a sweetened breakfast drink and three honey cookies, because she is such an expert at postponing satisfaction. The chef didn't reply.
"You have to stop with this mysteriousness," I told him. "What's so special about this chicken? Is it a talking chicken? Is it really a pigeon?" At that moment he burst into loud laughter. "Speak to me," I begged him, "or I'll hit you with this arava [willow branch], according to the custom on Sukkot."
Finally he spoke. "It's not any old chicken, it's a sandwich wrapped in chicken." Now I understand where my white roll disappeared to - he turned it into chicken stuffing. We packed the boiling hot pot, went down to the car singing "That's what happens when the path is long ...," piled in and took off. The eldest said, "Do you understand what a smell of chicken there is here?" The little one slept among the vapors of dinner and we passed Nir Banim and crossed the section of the road where it splits, after which the desert finally comes into view. During these October days you won't find any greenery, with the exception of a few traffic lights scattered here and there, until the first rains.
Doughs that have been baked, such as light rolls, are not meant to be cooked in a double pot full of steam, they will simply dissolve in it and turn into sponges. chickens, on the other hand, are meant for cooking, otherwise how can we eat them? Therefore, cooking them together must be done relatively quickly in a hermetic environment, so they can merge.
For this recipe, the most suitable pot is molded from steel and coated inside with a layer of black enamel. To ensure that the steam will not escape from it during roasting, you need to apply a ring of raw dough that glues the cover to the pot. In order to prevent overly wet roasting, all the ingredients of the dish must be as dry as possible. And in order to ensure that everything will be browned, the ingredients have to be browned, each one separately, before their entry into the pot.
1 spicy green pepper, coarsely chopped
1 peeled garlic glove, coarsely chopped
1 tbsp. olive oil
1 tbsp. grated Parmesan
Zest of 1/4 lemon (only the yellow or the green part)
6 basil leaves, coarsely chopped
A pinch of salt
Crush all ingredients in a mortar or a food processor, until a smooth mixture is obtained.
A handful of pitted kalamata olives, coarsely chopped
2 peeled garlic cloves
1/4 spicy green pepper, coarsely chopped
1 tbsp. olive oil
Crush all the ingredients in a mortar or a food processor into a homogeneous - but not smooth - mixture.
1 roll that can be pushed inside the chicken, preferably of white flour (not a diet roll)
The pepper spread
The tapenade
Red peppers, onions, slices of eggplant and tomatoes, roasted in the oven with olive oil, or on the griddle
1 small sprig of chopped parsley
1 scallion, coarsely chopped
A handful of black pepper, coarsely ground
1. Cut the roll lengthwise, but don't separate the two halves. First spread it with the pepper spread and then with the tapenade. Line with the roast vegetables, scatter parsley, scallions and black pepper, close and press together.
2. Using kitchen string, tie the sandwich lengthwise, the way you tie a piece of meat.
A very fresh chicken, rinsed and dried well
Olive oil for browning it
2 sprigs of rosemary or sage
1. Heat the oven to 190 degrees Celsius.
2. Spread the inside of the hen with what is left of the pepper spread and the tapenade. Tie the legs behind it crosswise (see photo) with kitchen string, and under the knot place the rosemary or sage sprigs. Brown in a large frying pan in a small amount of olive oil.
50 gm. cold butter, cut into cubes
6 small onions, unpeeled
2 heads of garlic cut lengthwise, brushed with olive oil and salted
4 medium potatoes, peeled and cut lengthwise, brushed with olive oil and salted
For the dough ring:
1 cup of flour
1/2 cup water
3. Take a steel pot slightly larger than the chicken, with a cover. Place the chicken in the pot, add the cut garlic heads, onions and potatoes. Scatter the cubes of butter on top and cover the pot.
4. Mix 1 cup of flour with 1/2 cup water until you get a "dough paste"
5. With the dough, seal the narrow opening between the pot and the cover, using the dough as a kind of thick belt. Place in the lower third of the oven and roast for two hours. The pot is sealed, there are no signs of what is happening inside and no smell. Nothing emerges from the pot, but the brown ring of dough becomes golden brown.
6. After two hours, remove the pot from the oven; it will need another 5 minutes alone in order to calm down. Now break the dough covering. The chicken is golden brown, immersed in a shallow puddle of thick juice into which all the golden colors have melted. Inside waits the sandwich that has merged with the hen, still tied with string. Cut the string and eat.