St. Augustine Chicken
Ingredients:
- 1 boneless, skinless chicken thigh cut into bite sized pieces
- 1 tsp to 1 1/2 tsp smoked paprika
- 1 tsp garlic powder
- 1 tsp minced onion flakes
- 1/4 tsp cumin
- 1/4 tsp thyme
- 1/4 c. Spanish olives, chopped
- olive oil
- 1 Tbsp flour
- 1/4 c. chicken broth
Instructions:
- Combine paprika, garlic, onion flakes, cumin, and thyme in a small bowl.
- In a medium sized bowl, combine chicken, olives, and olive oil. Add your spice mixture. Mix it all up with a rubber spatula. Make sure everything is good and coated with the spices.
- Heat a small amount of oil over med-hi heat. (You don't need a lot of oil because there's oil on the chicken, plus chicken thighs have a lot of fat on them.) Add chicken and brown on all sides.
- Once chicken is browned, scoot it over to one side and sprinkle flour into the pan. I used about a tablespoon of flour. Make sure to lightly scrape the bottom of the pan to stir up all the little bits of fat and seasoning. Add the chicken broth and stir the chicken back into the mixture, and let it thicken and cook until chicken is at least 165 degrees.
- If desired, soak up some of the excess oil with a paper towel.
Served tonight with brown rice and peas. I'm going to get about two servings out of this, but it depends on how hungry you are. Besides, leftovers are good, right?
Now, I hear you asking "Why is this called St. Augustine chicken?". Well, earlier this year, I went to St. Augustine and got the most delicious chicken empanada from The Spanish Bakery. I've been trying to recreate that flavor ever since. This comes pretty close. If you are ever in St. Augustine, hit up The Spanish Bakery for their delicious pastries. I hope that once this virus has gotten under control, I'll be able to go back and get another empanada (or two....or three....) with datil pepper sauce to dip it in.
If you want a smokier flavor, you can add chorizo to your chicken. However, chorizo is really oily, so use caution. Red bell pepper and carmelized onions are also really good with this, but I didn't have either on hand at the time. You could probably make this into an empanada filling, too, but you might want to add a little extra flour to thicken it before you load it into the pastry so that it doesn't leak everywhere.
A note on the chicken broth: I freeze chicken broth in a plastic-wrap-lined ice cube tray so that I have small amounts on hand when I need them. Ice cube trays are a great way to portion out ingredients you only need a small amount of, like broths, lemon/lime juice, fresh herbs (freeze them in olive oil or water), and tomato paste. I recommend lining them with plastic wrap so that the flavor of whatever you're freezing doesn't seep into the plastic of the ice cube tray, or in the case of the tomato paste, stain the tray.
As always, if you tried this, let me know how it came out.
