Chicken. Chook chook chooky...

LET’S TALK ABOUT LOW-BUDGET CHICKEN PIECES or …

… HOW TO MAKE A COMPLETE MEAL FOR 4 PEOPLE @ $1.25 per SERVE.

KEEP IN MIND, however, that the $5 total does not include gas for the stove, electricity to run fridge and freezer, the cook’s hourly rate (should he/she have one), the fuel to and from the supermarket, the cost of hot water and detergent and rubber gloves, or dishwasher-running cost (should he/she have one), and so on and so on. In other words, don’t take at face value everything you read or hear about food - not even on a Frog Blog. There is a Big Bad Business World full of bold and subtle advertising that drives our eating habits and food beliefs. However, I do think it is possible, on a low budget, to eat very well and with great joy. (When an activity is compulsory several times a day for the whole of life, an expectation of being joyful on the job surely helps!)

It also helps if one likes to eat chicken. For quick, cheap, tasty meals (no, I don’t eat my own feathery friends), I keep a few 1 kg bags of frozen mixed chicken pieces in the small chest freezer (which is really very economical to run, especially when the food stuff comes home already frozen). Supermarket chicken. Neither free-range nor organic, although the producer assures me on the packaging that the chickens are all barn-raised, grain-fed, free from hormones etc. Mind you, Australian Food Standards require that all chicken for human consumption be free from hormones and antibiotics. At about $4/kilo, the chicken pieces are literally a mixed bag, but at that price... Today’s bag, for example contained 2 wings, 1 drumstick, 3 thigh pieces and a large piece of breast on the bone (which is the juiciest way to cook breast, so that’s fine); whereas the chicken photographed at the end of this post, in tomato-based sauce, came in a bag of eight small tidy thigh pieces. Just right for 4 serves.

Chicken from a mixed bag - with pea pilau

 I always skin chicken. 1 kg, whether in the shape of a whole free-range bird or budget pieces, will yield 150-200 grams skin and fat. That’s an awful lot of saturated fat; it is also, unfortunately, where much of the flavour lies. So, I extract that flavour by using the skin and fat to make stock. Always. The job takes ten minutes, using the pan the chicken will be cooked in (saves washing up). The stock can be made while marinating other flavours into the poor denuded chicken. It is easy to do, as the Town Frog pointed out a little while ago. We’re including another version to hammer home the point - Don't waste, don't toss.

CHICKEN STOCK from fat scraps.

Removing set fat from stock

In a saucepan, fry until golden, 1 diced onion, a few grinds of black pepper, chicken skin and fat. Add herbs if handy - bay and old rosemary stems. When coloured, add 1 cup water. Simmer 10 minutes. With a slotted spoon, remove skin (to the dog-food tin, which is safe for Fido as no fat remains). Pour stock into small heat-proof bowl, a layer of liquid fat will rise to the surface. Cool, then refrigerate. When the fat is white and firm, peel it from the now jellied stock. Fat will clump and lift off in one piece leaving a fat-free stock.

I usually feed the fat to the backyard egg-layers, mixed in with other kitchen scraps. The girls fight for it - like children scrabbling for chocolate.

The following recipes, using budget chicken pieces, are for easy-to-make, one-pot family meals that provided the whole package-deal of nutrition - carbs, protein, vitamins, minerals, fibre and FLAVOUR. What more could you ask for $1.25 per serve?

CHICKEN PIECES with PEA PILAU RICE (photo, above)

Cooked all in one pan, the lightly marinated chicken provides the cooking liquor and flavour for the rice on which it is served.

Serves 4
10 minutes to prepare. 30 minutes to marinate. 40 minutes cooking time.
You will need: Deep stovetop frypan with a lid; meat-cutting board, onion-cutting board, sharp knife; large dinner plate slightly larger than frypan diameter; 1 cup measure; citrus juicer; serving platter or serve from the pan.

Ingredients:
1 kg mixed chicken pieces, bone in (for big eaters, use extra chicken)
1 large onion, diced
1 lime or ½ lemon, juiced
1 rounded teaspoon mild curry paste (or dry spice powder and ¼ teaspoon salt)
1¼ cups long grain white rice, or Thai jasmine or Basmati rice
2 cups water
1 cup fresh/frozen peas, or ½ cup dehydrated peas soaked in 1 cup water
vegetable cooking oil (preferably not olive - wrong flavour)

Quick instructions: Skin chicken; marinate 30 min in lime and curry mix. Fry diced onion then lie the chicken on top; pour in marinade; simmer/steam with lid on 30 min or until cooked. Remove chicken. Add rice to pan and enough water to make pan juices up to about 3 cups; steam rice under lid 10 minutes. Add peas and return chicken. Cover tightly; continue to steam 5 minutes more until rice is soft.

Step-by-step instructions:

1. With your fingers, pull the skin from the chicken pieces. Trim fat (keep to make stock).
2. Place chicken pieces on a large flat plate.
3. Mix lime juice and curry, and add enough water to make ½ cup of mix; spoon over chicken. Marinate 30 minutes.
4. If using de-hydrated peas, soak in 1 cup water while chicken marinates.
5. Lightly fry onion in a little oil. Add chicken, bone-side down, marinade juices and extra ½ cup water.
6. Put the lid on the pan; simmer/steam on low heat 30 minutes. If the lid is not tight-fitting, may need to increase cooking time to 40 minutes, and check to be sure there is still liquid in the pan. Add more water to keep about ½ cm of pan juice.
7. Remove the chicken to a clean plate. Tip the pan juices into a measuring jug, and add water to make up to three cups (roughly 700ml).
8. Tip rice into the pan; stir to coat in residual chicken grease (there will be a small amount); then add liquid all at once. Stir until simmering. If using dehydrated peas, add soaked peas to rice. Turn heat to low; put the lid on and cook 10 minutes.
9. Stir the rice very lightly with a fork. The grains will still be firm-ish and should look wet. If looking dry add ¼ cup more water. Taste and add salt if needed.
10. If using fresh peas, place them over rice, then arrange the chicken pieces neatly on top, bone-side down. Cover and continue to cook further 5 minutes until rice is soft and peas are heated through.

To serve, take the pan to the table as is; or arrange chicken over rice on a platter. The dish is fine as a meal on its own, or dressed up for a party with a selection of small salads, Indian-style.

SPICY CHICKEN PIECES and SAVOURY RICE 

Serves 4. Use will need: Deep stovetop frypan with a lid; meat-cutting board, onion-cutting board, sharp knife; large dinner plate slightly larger than frypan diameter; 1 cup measure.

Ingredients:
1kg chicken pieces
1 large onion, diced
2 large carrots, finely cubed
2 sticks celery and/or other seasonal green vegetables, chopped finely
1 tablespoon mild curry paste
1¼ cups long grain rice
water
Optional: ½ cup lemon juice

1. Skin chicken (see above!). Add ½ cup water (or lemon juice) to paste and coat chicken. Let stand 30 minutes.
2. While chicken marinates, dice onion and vegetables. Lightly fry all in pan with little oil. When just coloured, tip into a bowl.
3. Add chicken and marinade juices to pan; tip vegetables over the chicken, and extra ½ cup water. Cover to steam/simmer 30 minutes.
4. Lift cooked chicken to a plate. Add rice and water to vegetables in pan; stir until simmering then cover and steam 10 minutes.
5. Stir rice. Taste. Add sprinkle salt if needed. Add chicken pieces on top. Steam a further 5 minutes.

ONE-POT CHICKEN with POTATO and OLIVES

Complete meal for 6 hearty eaters, using 2 bags of budget chicken pieces.

Ingredients:
2 kg mixed chicken or thigh pieces, bone in
2 medium onions, diced
4 - 6 tomatoes, diced (about 2 cups pulp, or 400gm can good-quality crushed tomato)
1 large carrot, cut into 1 cm cubes
2 stalks celery, chopped
fresh rosemary, parsley &/or basil, salt and pepper
olive oil
1 - 2 small scrubbed potatoes per person, cut into quarters or 6 pieces
½ cup crushed green or small black olives

1. Over medium heat, in deep frypan or wide saucepan, lightly fry onion, celery and carrot in small amount olive oil until onion starts to colour.
2. As vegetables cook, skin chicken pieces.
3. Add tomato to pan with few sprigs fresh rosemary, freshly ground black pepper and salt to taste (start with ½ teaspoon if using fresh tomato; less with canned tomato). Bring to boil, stirring now and then.
4. Place chicken pieces in sauce, bone sides down. Simmer gently for 15 minutes with lid on. (Don’t worry if chicken is not fully covered by sauce.)
5. Turn the chicken. Place chopped potato in a layer over the top pushing the potato down against the chicken with a spatula. Replace lid. Simmer further 15 minutes or until potato is tender to a fork.
6. Add olives over potato. Turn off the heat and leave the pot to sit, lid on, for a further 10 minutes before serving from the pan. Garnish with a sprinkle of chopped herbs.

Alternatively, omit potato (as shown above), and serve with steamed rice or crusty bread.

Next: Garden mint, and making old-fashioned mint sauce.

Written and compiled by two frogs

Soup soup soup glorious soup soup soup

This hearty, chunky-style vegetable soup will satisfy even the biggest appetite. It’s the sort of soup to make on Friday before a week-end when the family will be coming and going, with everyone running to their own private timetable - but still expecting to be fed!

You can call it minestrone if you want, but in our family dictionary that is just a fancy word for a pretty basic soup. Of minestrone, food writer the great late MFK Fisher says, 'it is a thick unsophisticated soup, heart-warming and soul-satisfying, full of aromatic vegetables' for 'those who are tired or worried or cross or in debt or in a moderate amount of pain or in love or in robust health or …' Leave it in the pot throughout the weekend and reheat to boiling at meal times (as long as it re-boils it won’t need to go in the refrigerator). With each reheat, add a little more water, a handful of pasta or more vegetables, a bit of left-over this or that. The pot will seem bottomless and the soup will keep on evolving and improving.

BASIC HEARTY FARM-STYLE VEGETABLE SOUP (or MINESTRONE)

You will need a selection of vegetables and herbs in season. The recipe is only a guide but onion is the one non-negotiable essential item. However, to earn the title of “Hearty” I am sure there should be a minimum standard - I don’t think I would vote for a brew that has less than six vegetables, and some foodies certainly demand beans in minestrone.

Quick and easy

For 6 - 10 big serves. Left-overs can be frozen.

This recipe is a vegetarian version but, if you wish, definitely add a good big handful of diced bacon, salami, leftover roast meat or fresh raw chicken. I sometimes throw half a dozen chicken wings into the pot or a few pieces of veal shank (the osso bucco cut).

Ingredients:
2 large onions
2 large carrots
2 - 4 sticks celery, with leaves
1 large red or green capsicum/bell pepper
2 large potatoes, scrubbed
1 - 2 cups green veg (peas, chopped beans, shredded silverbeet including all the silver bits)
½ teaspoon salt to start; freshly ground pepper
selection of fresh or dry herbs

1. Cut all vegetables into same-size bits - cubes of about 1 cm.
2. In large saucepan, fry onion with a few tablespoons olive oil until beginning to colour.
3. Add everything else; cover with water; bring to boil. Simmer until cooked, roughly 30 minutes but an hour is better.

Other things to use:

• Swede or turnip or parsnip; cauliflower or broccoli; sliced Brussels sprouts are very very good, or diced cabbage; pumpkin, squash, zucchini…
• Garlic, chilli, olives.

Then you will need at least ½ - 1 cup dry brown or green lentils, or 1 cup soaked chickpeas, or some pre-cooked red beans (canned kidney beans or 3 bean mix are fine).

Fresh or dry bay leaves and sprigs of fresh rosemary are almost as essential as onion; and try some thyme, parsley, basil, chives... but don’t use mint and be sparing with coriander.

If using dry herbs, avoid Gran’s Aussie stand-by - those packet Mixed Herbs - or the soup will taste like chicken stuffing. Start with a pinch or two of whatever you have and add more after the first taste test.

*   *   *

FROGBLOG TIP: If using dry chickpeas, soak beforehand for 6 hours (see chickpeas). They will then take 30-40 minutes to cook in with the vegetables. With lentils, you will need to add 1 - 2 cups more water during the cooking.

Taste the emerging soup after 30 minutes; add more salt, chilli, pepper and herbs if needed.
Stir in ½ cup dry pasta ten minutes before serving or when reheating (and more water).
Add canned tomato, or jar of mild Mexican salsa or tomato-based pasta sauce. Or fresh tomatoes.
Most of all, have fun creating your soup and enjoy the outcome.

This is my soup next day, 're-invented' with 1 cup dry elbow pasta, a can of good-quality Australian crushed tomato plus extra can of water, and a new dose of fresh parsley and fennel tops.

COUNTRY FROG RANT: There is ABSOLUTELY NO NEED or reason to add ready-made store-bought stock to a hearty-style soup. In the process of cooking the soup you are making your own beautiful stock. Any recipe that tells you to add extra is unthinkingly wasting your money or has been devised by a 'TV' cook/chef who is sponsored by the company which makes the stock.


Next: One of Town Frog’s 'urban' soups - something more 21st century than the ancient Mediterranean Minestrone.
Written and compiled by two frogs.

Lunch in the country

It’s a fine day down in The Valley and our country frog is planning lunch for family members visiting from nearby Brisbane. The old timber picnic table under the jacaranda needs to be cleared...

 … but the barbecue plate has been scraped and oiled, with a little helpful cheering from the onlookers.

It is just a matter now of removing the animals from the house yard where they all seem to be very happy...

... and then to prepare the meal. The chicken has been marinating under a blanket of yellow curry paste and will soon be ready to go on the barbecue with butternut pumpkin and onions.

And when the family arrives, they'll be greeted with a drop of champers and a platter of grilled fruit and vegetables to whet the appetite.

Then, as shadows lengthen and lingering country lunch is over, the guests might take a walk through the gumtrees to look for koalas…

… so that the hardworking clean-up crew can move in and tidy up the lawn.

About the food pictured: On the platter L) to R) is dry-grilled eggplant and red pepper, fresh cucumber, then alternating barbecued white nectarine and fennel bulb.

In the sparkling wine: Fresh-picked rosella hips boiled and preserved in a sugar syrup. Sometimes sold commercially as ‘wild hibiscus flower’, but far cheaper to make at home.

For Yellow Curry Paste recipe, click here. Chicken was barbecued under a hood (an upturned baking dish, in this case); unpeeled sliced pumpkin and ¼ onions were cooked on the BBQ plate 



About the animals: The Red-Neck Wallaby is common in eastern parts of Australia. Usually shy and solitary, they ‘nest’ in thick scrub during the day, coming out to feed at dawn and late afternoon. Our much photographed female, however, was a bottle-raised orphan who does not understand the wild and proper ways of her cousins. Mostly she lives off the land and sometimes does not come home for days, then she will poke along into the house and make camp in a favourite armchair or sprawl out beside the fridge, which she knows contains carrots and apples. During mating time, a big wild buck red-neck often visits, grunting amorously out on the lawn. 

Eastern Grey Kangaroos. Large and graceful, the emblemic kangaroo, is relatively common in cleared grassland that adjoins bush country. These two, a mature female with a youngster in the pouch, and her daughter from a previous year, frequently hop the fence for sweet pickings in the garden. Unlike the red-neck wallaby, eastern greys hang about in large family groups and the rest of this lot, about 20 of them, feed side-by-side with the horses. Safety in numbers, perhaps.

There are two koala colonies on The Farm where open eucalypt forest is recovering after it was virtually clear-felled by timber-getters in the 1960s. Today, this block of country is registered with Land for Wildlife, a government-funded scheme that assists landholders to provide habitat for wildlife through voluntary native flora conservation.

For more on habitat restoration see www.seqcatchments.com.au/LFW.html
For information on sustainable private forest practice visit http://www.privateforestrysthnqld.com.au/

Up a gumtree, safe and sound