Walnut & Pomegranate Chicken Stew

Chicken Stew With Walnuts & Pomegranate Molasses

MATTHEW0 COMMENTSFROM THE LUNCH BOX, RECIPES

Mar 08

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Quick Fried Chick

I normally would have left the entrée ’til last, but the rice dish that accompanies this dinner is so spectacular, so out of this world in both presentation and exotic goodness that this tasty entrée couldn’t compete. Don’t get me wrong, this walnut chicken dish is probably fairly typical Persian fair, but it’s quite special. The resulting dinner was super flavorful, and the opportunity to cook with pomegranate molasses–which up until now I had only used in cocktails (a decidedly un-Iranian thing to do, I’m sure)–was a culinary moment for me.

Well-Ground Walnut Crumbly Paste

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It’s a much faster meal to prepare than it appears to be from the recipe. Once you have the walnuts processed, it’s all downhill from there. And as the stew simmers, you can prepare everything else (yoghourt dip, rice, and set the table).Here’s how you you assemble the main course for this week’s meal:

Serves 6-8

Cooking time: 2 hours (Prep: 15 minutes; then stew for the remainder)

Ingredients

For the chicken:

2 lbs. skinless, boneless chicken thighs chopped into bit-sized pieces (approximately 1″ x 1″)

salt and pepper

Olive Oil for quick frying.

For the sauce:

1 lb. whole walnuts (recipe calls for 1.5 lbs of walnuts, but my bag was only 1 lb.)

6-8 c water

1 1/2 T ground tumeric

2 c pomegranate molasses (for the record, I only used 1 c)

1/4 c sugar

For the garnish:

16 oz. baby leaf spinach

1 medium red onion sliced finely for garnish

Instructions

1. Fry all chicken until well-browned on all sides, drain on paper towels, set aside.
2. Grind whole walnuts into a paste. You will need a strong grinding machine for this–Cuisinart, Vitamix, etc.  Return crumbly paste to a Dutch oven and add in the water. Bring to a boil, reduce to simmer.  At this point, I added the chicken back in. This is not in the recipe. It led to a finely stewed chicken thigh that wasn’t rubbery and firm, but chicken bites that fell apart beautifully.
3. For the record, I fried up one medium onion and added that as well to the paste and the stewing chicken.  The recipe most certainly did not call for that either!
4. After 90 minutes of simmering, pour in the pomegranate molasses. Again I adjusted the recipe here: the magazine says to simmer for two full hours and then add in the molasses for 25 minutes, but I had a show to watch on TV with my guests!  So, in the last thirty minutes of the two hours, I added in the molasses.
5. Garnish: Fry up a large batch of spinach in butter and garlic, dress the side of each bowl of chicken stew. Sprinkle finely sliced red onion

Cooking Tips:

• The surprise was the time it takes to fry up chopped, boneless, skinless chicken thighs in a pot that is about 6″ in diameter. Whew! That was exhausting. If I can make a suggestion, in spite of the spatter caused by frying thigh pieces up, use a 12″ skillet or larger, so you can get the pre-frying done more quickly.
• Have plenty of papertowel on hand to soak up the chicken fat and oil that accumulates
• Brown the meat thoroughly; the color will make the dish much more appealing.
• This recipe made much more sauce than chicken, so there was plenty leftover sauce, and not a lot of chicken for leftovers at work the next day. I highly recommend making more chicken.  It should be fine and flavorful.
• The original recipe calls for cooking the spinach in the stew for 90-120 minutes, but I can’t bring myself to do that. The glistening green spinach on the side of the decidedly brown stew was a nice contrast in colors, just as the flavor was a contrast in tastes. Accentuate that.

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