Recipe: Take Lucy Tweed’s Chicken With Salad Dressing Rice “Anywhere You Like”

If Every Night of the Week was Lucy Tweed’s shortcut to flavour town, the author’s latest cookbook Tender is all about taking the scenic route. Inside are 90 low and slow recipes for braises, soups and stews structured by protein. Plus, tips on how to choose the best cuts of meat for each. 

This one-pan chicken wonder is a perfect example of Tweed’s fun, anything-goes style. “I can’t tell you the number of iterations I’ve made of this,” she writes. “You literally can take this anywhere you like. Be inspired by any culture and any cuisine. Make your midweek one-pan wonders your own, as they should be.” 

Tweed suggests experimenting with different rices, curry pastes, proteins and even dumplings. The chewy, sticky, crispy rice will canvas whatever’s on hand. “The only limit is your imagination and possibly the fridge’s crisper contents.”

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Lucy Tweed’s chicken with salad dressing rice 

Serves 4–6
Preparation time: 15 minutes
Cooking time: 1 hour

Ingredients

1 tbsp olive oil
6 bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs
Salt
1 onion, chopped
4 garlic cloves, smashed
1 rosemary sprig
1 tbsp dijon mustard
1 tbsp wholegrain mustard
125ml (½ cup) dry white wine
200g (1 cup) long-grain white rice
375ml (1½ cups) chicken stock
200g green beans, trimmed, sliced if thick
1 tbsp butter
1 tsp fresh thyme leaves
Chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley, to serve

Method

Preheat the oven to 180°C fan-forced.

Heat the olive oil in a large heavy-based casserole over medium heat. Season the chicken with salt and place it, skin-side down, in the pan. Cook until golden and crispy, about 10 minutes, then flip and sear the flesh side for 2 minutes. Remove and set aside.

Add the onion, garlic and rosemary to the pan, stirring to coat them in the oil. Add both the mustards, then add the white wine and deglaze the pan, scraping the base. Simmer briefly and reduce a little.

Add the rice and stir to coat it in the mustardy base. Pour in the stock, bring to a gentle simmer and cook for 5 minutes.

Nestle the chicken back into the pan, skin-side up. Transfer to the oven and bake, uncovered, for 25 minutes.

Remove from the oven, tuck the beans around the chicken, dot the butter over the top and sprinkle with the thyme. Cover loosely with foil and return to the oven for 10–15 minutes until the beans are just tender and the rice is cooked.

Scatter generously with fresh parsley and serve straight from the pan – saucy, crispy, chewy and fluffy in all the right places.

Refrigerate in an airtight container for up to 3 days, or freeze for up to 3 months.

Notes

Experiment with rice types! This is about exploration... or what you have in the pantry.

If the rice starts to look dry, top up with an extra splash of stock or water mid-bake.

Swap green beans for broccolini, asparagus or even peas or spinach. The only limit is your imagination and possibly the fridge crisper contents.

This is an edited extract from Tender by Lucy Tweed. Photography by Rob Palmer. Published by Murdoch Books (RRP $39.99)