Aunt Neglas Awarma Food

CHICKEN SHAWARMA (MIDDLE EASTERN)

Steps:

• Marinade chicken - Combine the marinade ingredients in a large ziplock bag. Add the chicken, seal, the massage from the outside with your hands to make sure each piece is coated. Marinate 24 hours (minimum 3 hours).
• Yogurt Sauce - Combine the Yogurt Sauce ingredients in a bowl and mix. Cover and put in the fridge until required (it will last for 3 days in the fridge).
• Preheat stove or BBQ - Heat a large non-stick skillet with 1 tablespoon over medium high heat, or lightly brush a BBQ hotplate/grills with oil and heat to medium high. (See notes for baking)
• Cook chicken - Place chicken in the skillet or on the grill and cook the first side for 4 to 5 minutes until nicely charred. Turn and cook the other side for 3 to 4 minutes (the 2nd side takes less time).
• Rest - Remove chicken from the grill and cover loosely with foil. Set aside to rest for 5 minutes.

OVEN-COOKED CHICKEN SHAWARMA

Steps:

• Take a large resealable freezer bag and put the chicken thighs in it. Using a fine grater, preferably a microplane, grate in the lemon zest. Squeeze the lemons and add the juice. Pour in the olive oil and add the garlic, then add all the remaining ingredients.
• Squish everything about together, then seal the bag, place it on a plate or in a dish, and refrigerate for at least 6 hours, or up to 1 day.
• When you're ready to cook, preheat the oven to 220C/200C Fan/Gas 7. Remove the chicken from the fridge and allow it to reach room temperature.
• Tip the contents of the freezer bag into a shallow roasting tin - mine measures 44x34x1.5cm/17x13x½in - and make sure all the chicken thighs are lying flat and not on top of one another (if possible) before roasting in the hot oven for 30 minutes, by which time they should be cooked through (though obviously you must check) and golden on top.
• When the chicken's more or less cooked, make the sauce simply by combining the yoghurt with the tahini and garlic, stir and salt to taste, and sprinkle with a few pomegranate seeds.
• Line a platter or a couple of plates with crisp lettuce, shredded or torn into pieces, and then top with the piping hot chicken, pouring the oily juices over them, unless you are, for some inexplicable reason, anti-oily-juices. If you wanted to make the chicken go further, you could cut the thighs into chunky slices rather than leaving them whole. And please do add any of the suggested accompaniments, itemized in my introduction.

CHICKEN SHAWARMA

Steps:

• Tip all the ingredients, except the chicken and lemon wedges, into a blender or a smoothie bullet with 1 tsp sea salt and whizz to a smooth paste. Pile the chicken into a bowl or large plastic container, pour over the paste and mix through so the chicken is completely coated. Cover and marinate for at least 4 hrs or up to 48 hrs - the longer, the better.
• Cooking on the barbecue: Light a lidded barbecue, and let the flames die down. Once the coals have turned ashen, pile them up on one side with a few coals scattered around the other. Starting and ending with half a baking potato, thread all the chicken onto two long metal skewers - so that both skewers go through each piece of meat - packing the thighs down between the potato halves so that they are really compact. Place the large chicken kebab to the side of the barbecue with only a few coals underneath. Pop the lid down and cook for 45-50 mins, turning every 15 mins, or until cooked through - prise the chicken pieces apart in the centre to check, or use a digital cooking thermometer; it should read 70C or more. Leave to rest for 5 mins.
• Cooking in the oven: Heat the oven to 220C/200C fan/gas 8. Sit the kebab across a roasting tin so it is suspended, or rest a wire rack over a roasting tin and place the chicken on top. Cook for 45-55 mins or until cooked through.
• Warm the naan on the barbecue or in the oven. Bring the kebab to the table to carve, wrap with warm naans, and serve with the other salads and lemon wedges for squeezing over.

AUNT NEGLA'S AWARMA

Steps:

• Salt the meat heavily and saute in a heavy pan, Cook past watery stage continue until tender but not mushy.
• meanwhile melt down fat and cook slowly until clarified.
• strain fat into jars containing the cubed lamb.
• the original recipe called for 1 leg of lamb + 1 lamb shoulder + 1 big sirloin.
• Seal the jars store in a cool dry place.