Chicken is the most genre-agnostic meat. It’s as at home in sandwiches as it is in stews, and myriad cuisines use it in their curries. You can roast it in a robust tomato-based sauce à la Julia Busuttil Nishimura, dust it with cornflakes and slip it into a slider like Gordon Ramsay, or let it act as a vehicle for spices in a succulent Sri Lankan curry by O Tama Carey. We’ve gathered 12 versatile ways to cook chicken, whether you’re throwing a dinner party, looking for a midweek family pleaser, or are keen on a weekend cooking project. Still not enough chook? Here are 11 more recipes to add to your to-cook list.
French flavours rule the roost in this chicken and mushroom dish from The Town Mouse, a beloved Melbourne restaurant that closed in 2018. Extra-juicy chicken with crispy skin is bathed in a sauce loaded with garlic, thyme and fenugreek, and it all gets extra depth of flavour via shiitake.
Reduced to its basic elements, Hainanese chicken rice sounds simple: poached chicken, rice cooked in chicken broth and fat, two kinds of sauce. Pull them all together and it’s easy to understand why this dish is so widely loved: each element adds up to an extraordinary whole.
Chicken inasal (Filipino barbequed chicken) is typically eaten with plain white rice but here, John Rivera from Melbourne gelateria Kariton Sorbetes whacks it between slices of sourdough to soak up the tangy, salty, spicy, sweet sauces. It’s a top-tier work-from-home lunch option and yields plenty of extra chicken for later.
This is one of those dishes that’s even better the next day – the sauce of the tomatoes, green olives, rosemary and bay develops overnight for an even richer flavour. Mop it all up with crusty bread or polenta, and perhaps serve with Busuttil Nishimura’s blue cheese salad on the side.
Got a bit of time on your hands? Making this Sri Lankan chicken curry is a worthy use of it. O Tama Carey, chef-owner of Sydney’s Lankan Filling Station, says once done this beauty is “hot and oily, tangy with tomatoes and sweetly spiced with cardamom and cloves”. Sign us up.
Gordon Ramsay wants you to ditch the breadcrumbs for this recipe – he reckons cornflakes are way more crunchy and flavoursome. Coupled with a gochujang mayo and slipped into a slider, this is an unexpected (and unexpectedly quick) recipe from a chef whose restaurants hold multiple Michelin stars.
Like so many of Adam Liaw’s creations, this dish is designed to make both adults and kids happy. It’s a chicken-y riff on a pork-based dish the cook’s grandmother made him as a child, and is very nearly foolproof. The result is extra-crispy chicken coated in a glossy, tangy tomato sauce.
The crunchy exterior and juicy interior of perfect fried chicken can be hard to replicate at home. In this recipe, Melbourne butcher Meatsmith reveals the secret to unlocking the golden ratio that’s made its fried chicken burger a bestseller.
Joseph Abboud, chef-proprietor of Melbourne restaurant Rumi, says he can’t believe this dish isn’t more commonplace. It’s a spin on a Lebanese classic typically made with fish, and gets its signature creaminess from tahini. Any leftover chicken will make a fine sandwich.
Crispy chicken sticky with a tangy, sweet lemon sauce harks back to 1960s Hong Kong, but it’s become a staple dish at Chinese restaurants around Australia. This version is double fried to amp up the crispiness, and multiple sources of lemon offer an extra-citrusy punch.
Take chicken, rub it with this salty-spicy-sweet jerk seasoning and you end up with this vibrant dish that brings a little more to the table than your typical roast chicken. Serve it with a crunchy slaw and you’ve got a new classic to add to your dinner party repertoire.
This recipe, by du Fermier chef-proprietor and industry stalwart Annie Smithers, might just become your go-to roast chicken. It’s a French-style take with a good glug of wine and a decent amount of oil and butter. Add a couple of sides for your next dinner party, then use the leftovers for tomorrow’s lunchtime sandwich.
