Peri Peri chicken

[aaron333]

My first cooking thread, so be nice

This is also the first time I've attempted this, heck it's the first time I've cooked with a whole chicken

Ok. So you will need:

- A whole chicken
- Half a lemon
- Thyme (Fresh or Dried)
- Red Wine Vinegar (or Balsamic if you don't have any)
- Garlic (I used 3 cloves as I like my garlic, less if your not so keen)
- Olive Oil
- Chilli of your choice

1) Spatchcock the chicken. (Plenty of videos about to help, see here). I didn't remove the breast bone but you can if you want. Get rid of the excess fat on it while your at it.

2) Prepare the marinade. Into a blender goes the olive oil and the red wine/balsasmic vinegar, 25% vinegar to Oil. Add to that the juice of half a lemon, the thyme, chopped chilli and the whole cloves of garlic. Marinade the chicken for 24 hours.

3) Cook and enjoy . The chicken I used was around 1.2kg and I slpit the chicken in half. It took around 1hr 10 mins at Gas Mark 6 in the middle of the oven. Make sure you baste the chicken every 20 mins to stop it from going dry.

Yes, oven chips

I know it's quite a simple recipe for most people, but thought i'd share anyway. Really nice and crispy, certainly won't visit Nando's in such a hurry anymore, it worked out a lot cheaper and tastier

 

[aaron333]

DIY Nandos

Exactly

All in all, it cost me about a fiver tops.

Add some smoked paprika and onion to the marinade and you're a winner.

I'll bear that in mind, cheers!

 

[aaron333]

Interesting marinade. I like it and I'm going to give it a go

When I do peri peri I use the following on half a small free range chicken:

1 clove of garlic crushed into a paste with a large pinch of salt
1 large pinch of chilli flakes, about a level teaspoon to make sure it's HOT
Juice of 1/2 lime
Same again in olive oil

Mix it all together in a ramekin and cover the chicken in it. Roast in a hot oven and baste it regularly. I often put the lime half under the chicken to support it and it adds to the limey zing. It's important that it has quite a lot of salt to bring out the lime and garlic over the chilli

Awesome. From what I can see, bar the lemon/lime, the only real differeny thing is the Thyme and Red Wine Vinegar. I'll give yours a try some time.

is it as good as the nandos bottles you can get? seems rather simple thats all.

I'm not sure what you mean mate. You mean does the bottled Nandos Sauce taste as good as the marinade I made?

I just use the nando's sauce bottles you can buy from them

The marinade or the actual sauce?

 

[aaron333]

You can buy nandos marinade; it's rather good!

This! I just call it sauce

Yep, I didn't know if you meant the sauce or marinade. I've got some in, haven't used it yet though. Will do with the other half and see how it compares.

 

[aaron333]

But what's on the salt they put on the chips

Nando's use:

Ingredients
Salt (66%), Spices (African Brid's Eye Chilli (Peri Peri Chilli) (0.1%, Cayenne Pepper, Paprika, White Pepper] (26%), Sugar, Garlic, Acidity Regulators (Citric Acid, Sodium Acetate), Tomato Powder.