Chicken One Pot Style

Chicken, Potatoes, Leeks & Cauliflower

What's not to like about these ingredients? We season them with my ghetto version of fennel pollen to add to the sausage flavor without  sausage evilness. It all gets cooked in the oven so there is no pan to stir or food to scorch. Prep it, bake it, time the sequence and serve it. I like a simple salad of fresh leaf lettuce with oil & vinegar on the same plate. The acidity from the dressing mixing with the chicken makes a nice counterpoint to all the savory flavors.

Set oven @ 425   75 minutes total time    30 minutes active     serves 4 Cost less than $16.00

You will need a large Roasting Pan, a large steel bowl and a small steel bowl.

• 2 lbs boneless chicken in 1 1/2 inch chunks
• 1 link hot Italian sausage out of casing and in small pieces
• 1 1/2 lbs fingerling potatoes or any potato  cut into wedges
• 1 nice leek split, sliced and washed
• 1 T fennel pollen  look below for my homemade version of this spice
• 1/2 head of cauliflower cut into florets
• 1 cup chicken stock
• 2 teaspoon cornstarch
• 2 T white wine

Toss the potatoes in a tablespoon of veg oil, season and in the oven for 20 minutes.

Toss the chicken with 1/2 teaspoon salt and the fennel pollen in large steel bowl.

Add the chicken to the potato. Keep the potato off to the sides giving the chicken as much room as possible in the center of the pan. Cook for 10 minutes.

Add the sausage and toss. Add the cleaned leeks and the cauliflower. Season and add a drop of oil to the cauliflower. Back in the oven for 15 minutes.

Add chicken stock, back in for 5 minutes. Meanwhile in small bowl mix cornstarch and wine.

Take chicken out of oven and put on a burner over medium high heat. When the liquid comes to a boil pour in the corn starch wine mixture (slurry) and cook 1 minute until it thickens.

Taste, season, serve

Homemade Fennel Pollen

Fennel on steroids, the process is similiar to making saffron.

Toast 1/2 cup fennel seeds, 1/4 cup coriander seeds and 2 or 3 pieces of star anise. You can do them all in the same pan at the same time. Toast just until you can smell them, shake that pan like you mean it, grind in a spice/coffee grinder.

But I have no spice grinder, only my trusty coffee grinder. How am I suppose to make this without buying a grinder for spices when tag sale season is months away?  I'll tell you. Grind some cheap uncooked rice in your coffee grinder to clean it out. Grind the spices. Grind some cheap uncooked rice again. Desperate times call for desperate measures.