Tagine Cooking

For those of you who follow me on facebook you will have seen I have been a fan of Tagine cooking recently.  About a year ago Colin bought a book on Tagine recipes and Moroccan cooking.  Its an excellent book with a variety of dishes to suit all tastes.  Below are the recipes I have tried recently.  You will need either a Tagine of heavy based casserole dish (and lid) for these recipes  I have also made flatbread with these. Now there are so many different flatbread recipes, some with yeast some without, some wholly plain flour, some self raising, some mixing wholemeal etc!  Basically if you don't like the recipe I post below just google search and you will find a ton of alternatives.  I like this recipe though because I had never made any type of bread before and this was so simple so I have stuck with it. 

Chorizo and Chickpea Tagine (serves 4)

You will need:

• 175g dried chickpeas (I guess you can use the tin type instead though?)
• 2-3 tablespoons Olive Oil
• 2 Red onions, sliced
• 2 Garlic Cloves, chopped
• Roughly 15cm Chorizo sliced diagonally
• 2-3 Bay Leaves
• Several sprigs fresh thyme #(I subbed for dried thyme)
• 1-2 teaspoons  Spanish Smoked Paprika (its really important you use the smoked as it is part of the flavouring)
• Leaves from a small bunch of sage, shredded (again I used dried)
• Juice of 1 lemon
• Salt and Pepper (for seasoning)

So first of all you need to cook your chickpeas.  If you have used the dried variety you will need to soak them overnight, if you use the tinned just drain the juice from the tin.  You want to put them in a saucepan and cover with lots of water.  Boil the water than reduce the heat and simmer for approx 45 mins.  You want the chickpeas to be soft but with a bite.  Drain and run under cold water and peel off any loose skins.

Now heat the olive oil in your Tagine or casserole dish.  Stir in the onions and garlic and saute until they start to brown.  The throw in the Chorizo, bay leaves and thyme, again sauteing until lightly browned.  Add the chickpeas and paprika and cover with the lid. Cook on a low heat for 10-15 mins.  Before serving ass the sage and lemon juice and stir.  Season to Taste and voila!

Chorizo Tagine with lentils (serves 4-6)

You will need:

•  2 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 onions, chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, chopped
• 450g Chorizo 
• 2 teaspoons ground tumeric
• 2 teaspoons ground fenugreek
• 225g brown lentils (my local Tesco did not stock these so I bought red instead)
• 400g tin chopped tomato's
• 2 teaspoons sugar
• salt and pepper to season

Okay so first you need to heat your oil in your tagine or heavy based casserole dish.  Similar method to before and add those onions and garlic to lightly saute until they start to colour.  Add the chorizo slices and saute for 2 mins to flavour the oil.  Add the tumeric and fenugreek and lentils and stir to ensure even coat of spices.  Add the tomatoes and sugar and enough water to cover the lentils by 2.5 cm.  Bring the liquid to the boil, than reduce the heat and put the lid on cooking gently for approx 25 mins.  Check occasionally and add more water if needed.  Season to taste and your done!

Flatbread (makes approx 8 flatbreads)

You will need:

• 150g plain flour
• 150g wholemeal flour
• 1tsp salt
• 1 tbl spoon olive oil
• 120 ml water

So mix the flours and salt than add the oil to the water and give it a stir.  Add this to your flour mixture slowly then bring all the ingredients together until it forms a dough.  If the dough is sticky add more flour until it has a more doughy consistency.  Then dust a surface with flour to knead.  The best way to knead is to stretch the bread out, then roll it back towards you.  Repeat this several times.  The roll your dough into a long (but thick) sausage shape and divide into 8.  Roll these 8 parts into balls then again on your floured surface roll these out until they are about as thick as a 20p piece.  Heat your frying pan up (NO OIL) and when its hot add your flatbread (you need to do each individually),  A couple of minutes on each side should be enough and you have lovely homemade simple flatbreads!  I also recently made these to accompany a curry dish and they were fab!  Much healthier alternative to Naan Bread!