The Ottolenghi Test Kitchen’s Spicy Rotisserie Chicken Bake with Blue Cheese Dressing
This spicy chicken bake with blue cheese dressing from The Ottolenghi Test Kitchen is rich, spicy, and cheesy. Perfect for cold autumn evenings.
From the book
Ottolenghi Test Kitchen: Extra Good Things
Flexibility, flavour, and future-proofing your cooking
From simple midweek dinners to complex showstopper meals
Enjoy a little something extra to transform your next meal
Introduction
This dish came to life after a discussion we had at the OTK, when dreaming up ideas of what to make with a cooked rotisserie chicken that you’d buy at the shop. Chicken mayo sandwiches were a strong contender, but so was this bake inspired by spicy chicken wings and blue cheese dressing. Serve with some warm corn tortillas or the black beans and rice (p. 87 of Extra Good Things). If you can’t get hold of cascabel chillies, use ancho instead.
Ingredients
| 15g | dried cascabel chillies, stems and seeds removed |
| 15g | dried chipotle chillies, stems and seeds removed |
| 3 | limes, 2 tbsp juice and 1 cut into 4 wedges to serve |
| 150g | celery, trimmed, peeled to removed the stringy bits and very thinly sliced (100g) |
| 1 | fresh red chilli, roughly chopped, seeds and all (15g) |
| 6 | garlic cloves, peeled and roughly chopped |
| 400g (about 4) | plum tomatoes, quartered |
| 3 tbsp | olive oil |
| 2 | onions, peeled, halved and thinly sliced (360g) |
| 450g (about 1 small chicken) | cooked rotisserie chicken, skin off, roughly shredded into large pieces |
| 20g | fresh coriander, roughly chopped |
| 5 (75g) | trimmed and thinly sliced |
| 150g | buffalo mozzarella, roughly torn |
| salt | |
| For the blue cheese dressing: | |
|---|---|
| 150g | soured cream |
| 100g | cream cheese |
| 100g | Roquefort, or Gorgonzola for a milder version, finely crumbled |
| 1 tbsp | whole milk |
Essential kit
You will need: a food processor.
Method
Put all the dried chillies into a small heatproof bowl and pour over enough boiling water to cover. Weigh them down with a saucer and leave to rehydrate for 20 minutes.
Put the lime juice, celery and a pinch of salt into a small bowl, mix well to combine, and set aside to lightly pickle while you continue with the rest.
Drain the rehydrated chillies (discarding or saving the liquid for another use) and then roughly chop them. Add them to a food processor along with the fresh chilli, garlic and tomatoes then blitz until smooth.
Preheat the oven to 240°C fan, or as high as your oven will go.
Put the oil into a large, ovenproof, cast-iron frying pan and place it over a medium-high heat. Once hot, add the onions and cook for 12 minutes, stirring occasionally, until softened and deeply browned (turn the heat down if necessary). Add the blitzed chilli mixture, 100ml of water and 1½ teaspoons of salt. Bring to a simmer, then turn the heat down to medium and cook for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until nicely thickened. Add the chicken and another 100ml of water and simmer for 10 minutes more, stirring occasionally, until nicely coated in the sauce. Off the heat, stir in the coriander and two-thirds of the spring onions.
In a medium bowl, combine all the ingredients for the blue cheese dressing along with ⅛ teaspoon of salt and mix until combined. Reserve half of this mixture, to serve, and dollop spoonfuls of the remainder on top of the chicken mixture. Top evenly with the mozzarella and bake for 15 minutes, until nicely browned and bubbly. Leave to settle for 5 minutes.
Stir the remaining third of the spring onions into the celery and spoon half of this over the bake. Serve the remaining pickled celery, blue cheese dressing and lime wedges alongside.
Blue cheese dressing:
– Store refrigerated in a sealed container for up to 3 days.
– Serve as a dip for crudités, alongside the chicken wings with banana ketchup (p. 94 of Extra Good Things) or as an alternative dip for the sweetcorn nuggets (p. 26 of Extra Good Things).
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