Chicken tajine with honey and pears

This is a new friend of mine! I bought it today :) I have been fascinated by tajines for a while now and actually planned buying one with discount during the Dny Marianne. But then I saw this offer above and decided to buy the green tajine now. It can be used to cook on a stove and in the oven, very unusual for glazed clay pot! I think it may well become one of my favourite pieces of cookware.
This is the first dish I tried cooking in my new and shiny tajine and it worked out beautifully!

The original recipe comes from one of my favourite food blogs. I amended the recipe a bit though. This represents Morrocan food is to me - fragrant, rich, delicate, sweet and savoury at the same time, colourful. Delicious!

Ingredients:

1 whole chicken chopped into pieces

1 medium onion, very finely chopped

1 smallish bunch of coriander

2 medium sized sticks of cinammon

1 tablespoon of grated ginger

300ml of saffron water (details later)

4 firm pears

50gr of butter

5 tablespoons of honey

salt, white pepper

olive oil

Heat up some olive oil in you tajine and throw in the chopped onion, fry it on medium flame until soft and translucent. Turn up the heat and add the chicken, let brown for several minutes. Pour 300ml of warm (NOT hot) water into a glass and add a small pinch (5-8 strands) of saffron or a teaspoon of ground saffron. Mix well. As the result you should have a bright orange liquid tasting strongly of saffron. Pour this liquid onto the tajine along with the cinnamon and ginger, add the coriander (tied together by a thread so it does not fall apart), salt and pepper. Cover and let simmer on medium to low heat for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes place the tajine into the oven, which has been heated to 170C-190C. Leave for 45 minutes.

Meanwhile peel the pears, remove stalks and cut into quarters. In a non stick pan heat up the butter, add the pears and the honey. Let the pears caramelise on high heat until a brown caramel forms. You can see it and also smell it - it's brown, sticky and smells like candy.

After the tajine has been in the oven for 45 minutes add the pears together with the caramel. Let cook for another 15 minutes.

Serve with a neutral sidedish that is suitable for soaking up the delicious sauce, something like plain couscous or rice.