Chicken dish is serious about spice

New York Times food writer Sam Sifton begins his new cookbook See You on Sunday (Penguin Random House, $47) with 13 ways to make lively meals out of chicken parts.

Today’s recipe calls for serious spicing; Sifton uses Chinese five-spice powder on the chicken and puts Scotch bonnet pepper sauce in the dipping sauce.

The recipe is inspired by the Creole cuisine of Trinidad and Tobago.

Thighs are Sifton’s favourite chicken part for both moisture and flavour. Forget about washing raw chicken as long as you cook it to an internal temperature of 165 F (74 C), which kills bacteria, he says. Verify the temperature with a digital instantread thermometer.

Sifton recommends having a salad play “a supporting role” alongside the chicken; he suggests super greens such as baby kale, chard, arugula, spinach and perhaps bok choy.

The dressing should be three parts oil to one part acid such as lemon juice or sherry vinegar, thickened with mustard, cheese or mayonnaise.

See You on Sunday offers 200 recipes designed for entertaining a crowd with ease.

Photographs by David Malosh make Sifton’s fine book exceptional.