The return of Tomatoes!

My husband's official NO ULCER report arrived fresh from his endoscopy doctor early last week and besides a brief fear of Celiac Disease (later ruled out) it has been some of the best news we've gotten in some time.  We've thought he's had an ulcer since early September and I've had to modify our diet drastically - most notably by cutting out all tomatoes and citrus. Boy have I missed them.  I tried to take it slow, I waited until Friday night to make fajitas (with homemade salsa!) and then on Sunday I pulled out this Moroccan Tagine that I've been eying ever since Christmas in The New Book of Middle Eastern Food by Claudia Roden.  It might have just been the tomato craving but we devoured this dish.

Djaj Matisha Mesla - Chicken with Tomatoes and Honey

Recipe from: The New Book of Middle Eastern Food by Claudia Roden

Ingredients:

 A 3-4 pound Chicken, cut into quarters - I used a whole, bone in chicken breast.

3 tablespoons oil

1 large onion, grated - grated? I just cut normally.

2 pounds tomatoes, peeled and cut into pieces

Salt and plenty of pepper 

1/2 teaspoon ground ginger

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon crushed saffron threads or powdered saffron - I haven't located a good saffron that I am willing to buy yet (Penzeys Catalog is one the way!) so I used 1/2 teaspoon of Turmeric which I'm told is the "poor man's saffron" by Roden. 

2 tablespoons clear honey (Moroccans use up to 4 tablespoons)

3/4 cup blanched almonds, coarsely chopped, toasted under the broiler or fried in oil

2 tablespoons sesame seeds, toasted

The instructions are pretty easy for this one, I started by blanching the tomatoes:

 Wash and remove all stems and stickers from the tomatoes

Boil a large pot of water, in batches add tomatoes - boil for about a minute, until skin cracks

 Once the skin cracks, remove from the boiling water and put into an ice bath for another minute.

 The skins should slid right off and they're ready to cut!

Add the oil to the pan and turn the heat to medium low. 

Cut, or grate? the onion and add it to the hot oil. 

Add the sliced tomatoes.

Mix in all the spices and stir, stir, stir. 

Add the chicken and cook, covered for 1 1/4 hours, or until the chicken is done.

This is at about 45 minutes, my breast was done in just under an hour. Remove the chicken when tender and continue to cook the sauce until its reduced to a thick, creamy mixture. 

To speed things up on my end, I transferred the sauce to a cast iron pan to reduce. Tagines can't take heat over a medium-low and it would have been hours before my sauce was ready. Even with the cast iron, it took another 30 minutes before the sauce thickened. 

Being careful to not let the sauce burn, add the honey.  The sauce should begin to carmelize.  

After I added the honey, I returned the sauce to the tagine and continued to simmer until it was nice and thick.  

Meanwhile, I toasted some sliced almonds and sesame seeds under the broiler - be careful!  My first batch I burned nice and black!  J isn't actually allergic to almonds but he's still not to interested in eating them.  I'm on a huge almond kick at the moment and jumped at the chance to try them out with this dish.  I also cooked up some couscous and we were all set!

Yay for tomatoes :)