Stuffed rolled chicken with fennel and naartjie
If fennel and naartjie aren’t to your liking, substitute the fennel with a peeled green apple cut into blocks and use lemon juice and zest to taste, instead of the naartjie juice.
Serves 6
Preparation time: 30 minutes Oven temperature: 180°C Cooking time: 1–1½ hours
• 30ml butter
• 125g streaky bacon, chopped
• 1 red onion, chopped
• 1 fennel bulb, finely chopped
• 250ml ciabatta cubes (about 1cm)
• 1 sprig fresh fennel leaves, chopped • 30ml fresh naartjie juice
• 1 whole deboned chicken
• 15ml each olive oil and softened butter
1 Heat the butter in a pan and stir-fry the bacon until crispy. Add the onion and stir-fry until soft and glossy. Add the fennel and stir-fry until it is just tender. Remove from the stove and stir in the bread cubes. Add the chopped fennel leaves and season with black pepper and naartjie juice. Allow to cool.
2 Preheat the oven. Butterfly the deboned chicken on a clean work surface with the skin facing down and spread the filling across the middle. Carefully roll the meat around the filling to form a neat parcel and secure with kitchen string.
3 Place the rolled chicken in an ovenproof dish and rub all over with salt, pepper, olive oil and the softened butter. Add a variety of root vegetables to the dish, such as a few more halved fennel bulbs, carrots and garlic, as well as a few naartjie halves, and roast in the oven for 1–1½ hours until cooked through and golden-brown. Turn the chicken over once during the cooking time so that the skin on the bottom also becomes crispy.
Tip Add the fragrant filling to the cavity of a whole chicken if you can’t find a deboned one in the shops; it’s more difficult to slice but still delicious. >>