Madhouse recipe : Caribbean Creole Chicken

Here at The Madhouse, we eat a lot of chicken. When Madhouse Daddy was still around, I used to cook fairly plain "kid food" followed by a more complex, often spicier meal for the adults to eat later. We'd eat pork, beef, steak, salmon, duck, fish ... Since he died, I've gone back to eating at the same time as the kids and we all eat the same meals, which usually revolve around chicken, as they don't like most of the other meats. They don't complain if I serve it, but they just leave most of it on the side of the plate ! I spotted this recipe for Caribbean Creole Chicken on the Schizo Chef website and it appealed to me because I could marinate just one piece of chicken, giving the kids the plain version they prefer. I'm a bit of a wimp so I left out the Scotch Bonnet Pepper though !

Caribbean Creole Chicken

ingredients

a good squeeze of lime juice

2tbsp white wine vinegar (I used pomegranate vinegar that we brought back from Turkey)

2tbsp olive oil

1 tbsp minced garlic (I crushed then chopped 1 small clove)

1 minced Scotch Bonnet Pepper (nope, not for me ! I left it out)

1/2 an onion, finely chopped

1 tbsp ground cumin

1 tbsp ground coriander

a few sprigs of fresh thyme (I used 1 tbsp dried thyme)

1/4 cup parsley finely chopped (I used 1tbsp dried parsley)

chicken, on the bone or I used a chicken breast

salt and pepper to taste

Put the lime juice, vinegar and oil in a bowl.

Add the onion and garlic. I added a shake of chilli flakes too, as a nod to the Scotch Bonnet !

Toss in the cumin, coriander, thyme and parsley, along with some salt and pepper.

Mix it all up.

Put the chicken in the bowl and turn it several times to make sure all sides are covered in marinade. Leave to soak up all the juices and spices for a while if you have time, but if not, it can be cooked straight away. (I left mine for about ten minutes while I sorted out the rest of dinner.)

Fry the chicken in a pan, pouring over any remaining marinade while it cooks. You could serve this with rice or mashed potato.

It's a lovely marinade, full of spices and zesty citrus zing. Go easy on the vinegar though, as I felt that it was slightly too tart and tangy !