Recipe below: Moroccan-Style Chicken with Eggplant, Tomato, and Almonds
I was trying to figure out something deep and exciting to do with the last eggplants and tomatoes of the season when I recalled this mix: chicken, eggplant, tomato, almonds, and a big assortment of spices. Sounds good, doesn’t it? The sweet memory was from a recipe I used to make from Paula Wolfert’s The Foods of Morocco. She was my kitchen hero when I first started out, and I still think of her often. Much of my cooking style I picked up from her, especially when I needed to branch out from my family’s Southern Italian flavors (I love all those flavors, but sometimes a cook’s got to mix it up, you know what I mean?). She let me breathe in something new but not so far away culturally.
I went back to look at her recipe, and it still looks good. However, it wasn’t exactly what I wanted right now, so I changed up the spices and added two herbs I’ve still got plenty of in my garden, marjoram and spearmint (actually my mint variety is called berries and cream, a lovely, not-too-sharp, dark green, mellow mint that’s great in drinks, too). I especially liked the way all the spices and herbs blended with the eggplant and tomato, which formed a thick sauce for the chicken.
So scroll down to a cool-weather dish made with some of summer’s grand finale. Get it while it’s hot.
I have one thing to point about how I prepared the dish: I didn’t cook it in the classic Moroccan tagine way. First, I left the skin on the chicken and browned the pieces before braising them. Moroccan cooks would usually remove the skin. Also, I sautéed the onions and garlic along with the spices, letting them open up. That is European style and the way I prefer to cook. Moroccan cooks would more likely put onions, spices, meat, and liquids in the pot all at once and leave everything to slow simmer. I guess my approach is more in the Parisian Moroccan style.
Meanwhile, anyone out there who remembers Alleva Dairy on Grand Street may be interested to learn that they’ve just opened a branch at Chelsea Market.
As you may recall, Alleva’s lovely little shop was on Grand and Mulberry, right down the block from Di Palo. It opened in 1892 and was known as the oldest cheese shop in America. I used to go there all the time for their house-made mozzarella and ricotta, fresh pasta, all sorts of salami, and, most important, for their friselle, the tooth-cracking lard-and-black-pepper biscuits my mother always placed in the bottom of the bowl of her Christmas Eve zuppa di pesce. I haven’t been able to find those things anywhere else, and they don’t have them in the new Alleva shop. Alleva had a hard time during Covid and closed in 2023 and moved to New Jersey.
Now they’ve showed up at Chelsea Market. An odd choice, considering that Buon’Italia, an incredibly well-stocked Italian food store, thrives on the bottom floor, where almost all the serious food shopping now happens. Alleva is on the main floor, next to Anthropology and Moscot eyeglasses. There’s not much in the new store, at least not yet. There is some cheese and salami, and there are meatballs. I heard one of the shop people talking about chicken “parm,” but I didn’t see any. They have cannoli. I don’t understand the place. I can only imagine that in opening in a place already filled with first-rate Italian food they wanted to get in on the nostalgia for all things Italian American, figuring that tourists want meatball heroes, chicken “parm,” and cannoli. That’s what it looks like to me.
Moroccan-Style Chicken with Eggplant, Tomato, and Almonds
For the spice mix:
1 teaspoon each of freshly ground Espelette, turmeric, fennel seed, cumin, coriander seed, and dry ginger
For the rest:
4 chicken legs cut apart into thigh and drumstick
Salt
Extra-virgin olive oil
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 sweet onion, cut into small dice
1 garlic clove, peeled and lightly smashed
A big splash of dry vermouth
1 cup chicken broth
2 round summer tomatoes, peeled and chopped
1 large eggplant, stripe-peeled and cubed
1 tablespoon honey
A handful of Marcona almonds, lightly toasted, or regular whole almonds, blanched or not
6 sprigs marjoram, the leaves lightly chopped
6 sprigs spearmint, the leaves lightly chopped
Mix all the spice mix spices together in a small bowl.
Get out a large sauté pan, and set it over medium heat.
Season the chicken with salt and a few big pinches of the spice mix.
Add a big drizzle of olive oil and a tablespoon of butter to the pan. Add the chicken, skin side down, and let it brown, about 5 minutes. Turn it over, and scatter on the onion and the garlic. Sprinkle the rest of the spice mix over it, and cook until the onion starts to soften, about another 5 minutes. If you’ve got a lot of fat in the pan, drain some off.
Turn the pieces over again, and splash on the vermouth, letting it bubble away. Add about ½ cup of the chicken broth and all the tomatoes, bring to a boil, and then turn the heat to low, cover the pan, and simmer until tender, about 30 minutes.
While the chicken is cooking, get out another sauté pan, and drizzle in about a tablespoon of olive oil. Add the eggplant, seasoning it with a little salt, and sauté until it’s lightly browned and tender, about 7 minutes or so. Add it to the chicken pan, mixing it in. Drizzle in the honey, and add the rest of the butter.
When the chicken is tender, add the almonds and most of the marjoram and spearmint, holding back some of the marjoram and spearmint for garnish.
This dish should feel saucy. If you need to loosen it, add the rest of the chicken broth. Check for seasoning, adding more Espelette if you want more heat.
Serve with couscous seasoned with chicken broth, butter, and a touch of ginger.
