Chicken and Red Wine Casserole

You've got to love a nice warming casserole on a cold winters day and this is one from BBC Good Food is one of my current favourites. (Can you tell that the picture above is the remains in the casserole dish? No? Good.) There's nothing not to like about this, it's delicious and very easy to put together.

To be quite honest, I could take or leave the dumplings but Mr M must have a dumpling with his casserole so being the good wife I am, I obviously make the effort to get covered in sticky goo just for him. This is where the Magimix comes into its own, dumpling making. It's by far the easiest way to chop and combine all the ingredients.

Chicken and Red Wine Casserole

Ingredients

6 chicken breasts
3 tbsp flour
3 tbsp olive oil
3 onions, peeled and each cut into 8 wedges
200g smoked bacon lardons
3 garlic cloves, peeled and minced
300g large flat mushrooms, sliced
2 bay leaves
2 tbsp redcurrant sauce
3 strips of peeled orange zest
300ml red wine
300ml chicken stock

For the dumplings;
100g self-raising flour, plus extra for dusting
100g fresh white breadcrumbs
1 tbsp wholegrain mustard
140g butter, cubed
2 tsp fresh thyme leaves
2 tbsp fresh parsley, chopped
2 medium eggs, lightly beaten

Method

Preheat the oven to 200C/gas mark 6. Season the chicken with salt and freshly ground black pepper, then coat lightly in a little of the flour. Heat the oil in a large ovenproof lidded casserole dish and, in batches, brown the chicken on both sides over a high heat. Remove the chicken and set aside.

Reduce the heat, add the onions and lardons and cook for about 5-8 minutes so they are golden tinged. Add the garlic, then sprinkle in the plain flour and cook for 1 minute, stirring to prevent sticking.

Add the mushrooms, bay leaves, redcurrant sauce and orange zest, then pour in the red wine and stock and season with salt and pepper. Bring to the boil, then return the chicken to the casserole dish, making sure it is well covered with the liquid. Put on the lid and cook in the oven for 30 minutes.

While the casserole is cooking, prepare the dumplings. Put the self raising flour, breadcrumbs, mustard and butter in a food processor and blitz to a crumb consistency. Add the thyme, parsley, eggs and salt and pepper. Briefly blitz until the mixture forms a fairly moist dough. Using floured hands, roll the dough into 6 large, even-sized balls.

Remove the casserole from the oven when the 30 minutes is up and sit the dumplings on top. Pop the lid back on and return to the oven for a further 20 minutes, until the casserole is cooked and the dumplings have puffed up.

You can't always find redcurrant sauce at the supermarket, Tesco have a Finest one , but redcurrant jelly works just the same.

I served this with mashed potatoes and roast potatoes at the request of my dear husband (my fault, I gave him a choice, he chose both).

love & kisses
Mrs M x