Apr
Here is a delicious chicken recipe that comes from Lebanon. This, easy to make, chicken recipe does not rely upon complicated ingredients and techniques. The only trick to give you a tasty dinner that your family will enjoy is the slow cooking and the special lemon and garlic marinade.
Ingredients:
For the Chicken
4 Skin-on, boneless chicken breasts
2 Fresh Lemons completely juiced
6 cloves garlic
1 tsp Salt
1 tsp Pepper
1 tsp Basil
1/4 tsp Cayenne Pepper
6 large potatoes cut into 1/4 inch thick slices
For the ‘thoom’ marinade (Arabic for garlic)
4 cloves of garlic
1/2 cup olive oil
1/4 cup lemon juice
1/4 tsp salt
a dash of cayenne.
Directions:
Blend the lemon juice, basil, garlic, salt, pepper, and cayenne pepper to make the marinade.
Plsce the chicken breasts in a deep pan or bowl and pour the marinade over it making sure that all of the chicken is covered. Put a lid or cover on the container and let it sit in the refridgerator over night. In the morning turn the chicken over or move the breasts around. Let the chicken marinate for approximately 4 more hours.
Preheat your oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees celsius). Drain the liquid (but do not discard it) from the chicken and bake it in the preheated oven for 15 minutes. This is not to cook the chicken but only to brown it.
Next pour the marinade back over the browned chicken and cover the pan tightly with aluminum foil (Be careful not to burn your fingers!). Put the chicken and marinade back into the oven and reduce the heat to 250 degrees F (120 degrees celsius).
Baste the chicken with the marinade sauce every hour for three hours. After 4 hours add the potato slices to the pan and baste the chicken and potatoes well. Recover with the aluminum foil and bake for one more hour.
At this point you may blend all of the ingredient listed for the thoom. This will be used as a condiment for the chicken and potatoes.
Traditionally, this Lebanese Garlic Lemon Chicken is served with warm pita bread.
David Slone
http://www.articlesbase.com/home-and-family-articles/lebanese-garlic-lemon-chicken-105552.html
4 Responses so far to "Lebanese Garlic Lemon Chicken"
April 24th, 2010 at 8:13 pm
Middle Eastern Cuisine Question: What's the name of this food item?
I’d like to know the actual name to these items that I had last year in a middle eastern restaurant. Not the English names, but the names in your language, so I can order it that way the next time I go.
I had something like charbroiled chicken breast chunks (maybe kebabs) but there was no skewer in them.
I dipped them in this wonderful garlic sauce (I think its mashed up garlic, oil and lemon juice and blended into a very smooth mayonnaise like consistency)
I had this garlic sauce with my shawarma before too…if you have a simple recipe for this, i’d like it too.
Also, is this considered Persian or Lebanese cuisine? Let me know, thanks.
And could I order the garlic sauce at a Persian restaurant?
April 25th, 2010 at 1:15 am
The chicken could be Chicken Shawerma or Shish Taouk (shish
ka bab), or Ticka. I think the sauce you had you are right about but maybe a couple of teaspoons of tahini (ground sesame seed butter) plus all the other ingredients you mentioned were in the sauce. I think it might be a blend of both Perisan and Lebanese. I don’t know why don’t you try to order it at a Persian restaurant and see what they give to you?
References :
April 25th, 2010 at 1:17 am
It’s not necessarily either one. Balkan cuisine also includes it. You can have it in Yugoslavia, Greece, Macedonia, Bulgaria, etc.
As to the garlic sauce, the simplest recipe is as follows:
use freshly peeled garlic grains. Mince them well with salt in a ceramic bowl, using a ceramic or wooden pistil. After it turns into a paste, add virgin olive oil slowly, and continue mincing it until it turns into a puffy, white mayonnaise like paste. Add balsamic vinnegar or lemon juice (or lime juice) according to taste. For a diet version use yoghurt instead of olive oil. You can also use a food processor for the mixing and mincing process. You can also use it on fresh toast (it’s yummy!) or on fried potatoes, or boiled potatoes or vegetables. You can also try it with sour cream instead of yoghurt, if you want it to be very rich and you don’t like olive oil. According to taste, almost any other type of edible vegetable oil can be used. Feel free to improvise (add some paprika for extra spicyness and color). Also drastically improves boiled broccoli or caulliflowers. Of course, it is exquisite as a mayonnaise replacement for any other type of dish or sandwich that uses mayo. Try out my favorite: vegetable salade a-la-russe.
It goes like this: boil whole, unpeeled potatoes, carrots and cellery. Peel them and cut them in small cubes about 5 mm on each side. Then, cut small pieces of pickled cucumbers and peperonis and add to the pieced vegetables. Add boiled peas. Add some garlic mayo and some hot Dijon mustard (pay attention to the dosage, this one is really nasty!).
Put it in a bowl, cover it up with an icing made of garlic mayo. Decorate with slices of boiled carrot, leaves of pickled cucumber and petals of egg whites. Serve cold. Can be both a main course or apetizer. Can also be used as filling for boiled egg whites (cut boiled eggs in half, peel and extract yolk and then replace yolk with garlic mayo or boiled vegetables mixed with garlic mayo).
References :
My own cooking experience
April 25th, 2010 at 1:19 am
it sounds like you got kebabs and the sauce is not really a sauce but yogurt with shallots. if that’s the case it’s persian.
a shawarma is arabic. it’s a sanwich wrapped in pita and it has either chicken or beef.
if you got the chicken kebabs…in persian it’s called Jujeh Kabab and if you’re at a persian restaurant the only thing coming closest to the "garlic sauce" would be "mast o museer" which means yogurt with shallots.
tahini is arabic and you won’t find it at a persian restaurant. also when you go to persian restaurant they only have persian food. persians are very particular about this.
References :