Recipes

Spice Rub Chicken Leg Supper

Donal Skehan
Sat Oct 22 2016 - 05:00
Serves: 4
Course: Main Course
Cooking Time: 0 hr 50 mins
Ingredients
  • 4 large chicken legs
  • 4 tbsp olive oil
  • 6 long, thin carrots (about 450g), scrubbed and trimmed
  • 1 large red onion, quartered and root trimmed but left intact
  • Natural yogurt, to serve (optional)
  • For the spice rub:
  • 3 tbsp sea salt
  • 2 tbsp ground cumin
  • 2 tbsp smoked paprika
  • 2 tsp ground turmeric
  • 2 tsp cayenne pepper
  • For the bulgur:
  • 250g bulgur wheat
  • 100g tinned chickpeas, rinsed and drained
  • 50g dried apricots, roughly chopped
  • 50g sultanas
  • 500ml hot chicken stock
  • Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

This recipe doesn’t quite fit into the quick-cook, 15-minute meal category, but I do feel it deserves a little love for its simplicity. It’s dishes like this, using ingredients you are bound to have hiding away in the kitchen cupboards, which make for great cooking. Spiced chicken legs sizzle in the oven while all you have to worry about is sticking a few ingredients in a bowl and stirring. Kitchen meltdowns begone! – this is my kind of cooking.

Preheat the oven to 200°C (180°C fan).

Put the chicken legs into a bowl, pour over half of the oil and all the ingredients for the spice rub. Massage the spices all over the chicken until it is completely coated. (If you have time, cover the bowl with cling film and place in the fridge overnight to allow the flavours to permeate the meat.)

Transfer the chicken to a large roasting tray (40cm x 30cm) along with the carrots and red onion. Spread everything out on the tray, making sure there is enough space between all the ingredients on the tray for them to cook evenly. Pat some of the spices from the chicken on to the onions and carrots. Drizzle over the remaining oil and roast in the oven for 45 minutes or until the chicken is crisp, golden and cooked through, and the carrots are tender.

Halfway through the chicken cooking time, start preparing the bulgur. Place the bulgur wheat, chickpeas, apricots and sultanas in a bowl and pour over the hot stock. Stir and cover with cling film, then leave to stand for 20 minutes until the bulgur has soaked up all the liquid. Fluff up with a fork, taste, and adjust seasoning.

Serve the chicken on a bed of bulgur with the carrots, red onion and a dollop of natural yogurt if you like.

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