Chipotle - Honey - Roasted Chicken Tacos w / Pickled Tomato Salad

What if you were able to keep the best parts and flavors of a traditional roasted chicken dinner but gave it a twist to make it more exciting, unexpected and -for a lack of a better word- fun?

I love a roast dinner.

Turning my oven on during for the afternoon and slow-cooking flavourful dishes is the single most comforting activity I can do during winter time. The oven for me works as a much needed heat source in my freezing apartment. (It's a staggering -25ºC outside as I write this!).

That being said, one of the best ways to get me out of winter blues is a taco night.

The reason I love tacos is that they're interactive. They force your guests to build their own dish, make decisions, be creative, explore new flavours and combinations. They inevitably start a conversation about the food. And spark curiosity to see how the person next to you built their dish.

Planning a dinner for longer than a day makes an event feel special. It makes me concentrate on following the steps, seeing how the dish transforms. How it looks, feels, smells. And and finally sharing the final result with friends.

The chicken is first dry brined, anywhere from 5 to 48 hours. I know… I’ve already lost half of you. The main objective of the dry brine, which primarily includes salt and sugar is to draw out the moisture from the chicken and thus intensifying the flavors in the meat. Secondly, the rest of the spices (Chipotle, sumac, lemon zest, pepper, MSG) are there to flavor the chicken. And create a beautiful bright red crust on the skin.

After the dry brine comes the glaze. Which has pretty much the same flavors as the dry brine but in introduces moisture, in the form of honey, apple cider vinegar and olive oil. This when brushed into the chicken 1 to 5 hours before cooking is what will give the outside an amazing caramelized look. And it will further concentrate the flavors. And when you’re ready to send it to the oven half a can of apple cider goes on the bottom of the rimmed baking sheet, so that it catches all those delicious Chicken Juices (TM).

For building the tacos, I slathered some Labneh on the tortillas, then placed the chicken meat on top, then added some of the tomato - onion salad. Finally I spooned the chipotle - sumac - honey - chicken salsa on the whole thing.

These tacos are not only a serious mouthful but they're also super balanced, flavorful and unctuous.

Serve these with some beer or some really good tequila or mezcal and make sure you share this dinner with loved ones. We all deserve this.

Ingredients:

Chicken:

The Dry Brine:

• 1/2 cup of kosher salt

• 1/2 cup of white sugar

• 2 tbl spoons freshly cracked black pepper

• 1 teaspoon of chipotle powder

• 1 teaspoon of sumac (You can substitute with Tajin if you can't find sumac)

• 1 teaspoons of lemon zest

• 1 teaspoon of MSG

• 1 teaspoon of smoked paprika

The Glaze:

• 1 teaspoon of chipotle powder

• 1 teaspoon of sumac

• 1 teaspoon of MSG

• 1 teaspoon of smoked paprika

• 2 tbl spoons of honey

• 1 tbl spoon of apple cider vinegar

• 2 tbl spoons of extra virging olive oil

• The Chicken:

• 1 whole chicken

• 1 can of white beer

• 1 can of apple cider

• 1 white onion

• 1 orange

• 3 cloves of garlic

For the Tacos:

• Fresh corn tortillas

• 1 cup of Lebne or jocoque (To taste).

• 2 tbl spoons extra virgin olive oil

• Fresh herbs finelly chopped, (cilantro and / or parsley)

• Lime juice

For the Salad:

• 7 to 10 fresh tomatoes (I had a combination of small cherry ones and roma tomatoes)

• 1 red onion (I only had white available and it worked fine. The red onion is going to be a bit sweeter and will make the salad a bit more appealing, visually).

• 2 tbl spoons of extra virgin olive oil

• 1 tbl spoon of apple cider vinegar

• 1/2 a block of feta cheese, crumbled

• 2 tbl spoons of capers

• The juice of half a lemon

• Salt

• Pepper

Instructions:

- In a bowl, combine the ingredients for the dry brine and pat the chicken with the brine. You're looking to grab the dry brine with your hands and placing it / padding it on the chicken's skin as evenly as possible so that it almost forms a bright red crust.

- Leave to brine in the refrigerator, uncovered on a rimmed baking sheet for 5 to 48 hours. The longer you brine the chicken, the more moisture will escape from the chicken, making the skin increasingly crispy.

This also allows for the flavours to slowly penetrate the meat, making it more tender and flavourful.

- In a jar combine all the ingredients for the glaze and shake thoroughly. Sometimes the honey needs to be brought up a bit to temp so that it dissolves completely with the oil and vinegar. If you're seeing your honey lump up a bit, run some hot water on the jar until the mixture becomes warm enough and shake again.

- 1 to 5 hours before you're ready to stick the chicken in the oven, grab a spatula or a pastry brush and start glazing the chicken from all sides, and even in the cavity.

I actually glazed it and then half and hour later glazed it again, as I gave the honey and oil a chance to solidify on the skin the first time. (You should have some left over glaze after you're done. Save it for your pan sauce!).

- Finally I trussed the chicken, which is just a fancy way of saying I tied it's legs so that the inner part of the bird would be exposed to the heat and it would get browned evenly. You do not have to do this however, your chicken will come our juicy no matter what.

- Finally, place your chicken in a rimmed baking sheet and stuff the cavity with a quartered onion and a quartered orange. This will make the inside of the chicken perfume the entire thing as it cooks, and pour your cans of white beer and apple cider. Then place on the middle wrack of a preheated oven, at 350º for 60 to 70 minutes.

- While your chicken is in the oven, thinly slice your onion and place in a bowl with warm water, one table spoon of sugar, one table spoon of salt and a table spoon of vinegar. (White works best, but apple cider is works fine as well). Leave to rest for at least 30 mins.

- Slice your tomatoes and place them in a bowl with the capers, feta cheese, the olive oil, vinegar, salt, pepper, the lemon juice and finally, when they're ready, the pickled onions.

Toss gently to combine.

- After 60 minutes, take the chicken out of the oven and take the temperature. Make sure that both the breast and the thigh are at 163ºF minimum. (If it's slightly below just place back in the oven for another 8 to 10 minutes and check the temp again).

After pulling it out, leave to rest and take que bottom of the rimmed baking sheet and pour the beer, apple cider and chicken drippings on a pan with the remaining glaze. Taste it and if you think it needs a bit more spice, add another teaspoon of chipotle powder and sumac.

- Stir and let reduce for about 25 minutes on medium low heat.

The consistency of this sauce will seriously depend on the amount of fat that the chicken rendered and let drop on the beer/cider. If you see that the sauce is looking too watery with no consistency, spoon in a tablespoon of plain flower and whisk until it's completely dissolved. This will give it more of a gravy consistency.

After about 30 or 40 minutes of resting time, you should be able to grab the chicken with your hands without burning yourself. This means that it's ready to be carved.

I carved the two breasts and cut into slices so that everyone could just grab individual pieces and place them in their tacos.

In a pan I heated tortillas and placed the lebne in a bowl and mixed it with some olive oil to loosen it's consistency a bit.

Served everything buffet style and let everyone build their own plate.