Musakhan

Ingredients

• 1.5kg chicken, jointed into 4 pieces
• 1kg onions
• 200ml extra virgin olive oil
• 6 tbsp ground sumac
• 2 tsp seven spice (baharat)
• 1 tsp ground allspice
• 0.5 tsp ground cardamom
• 2.5 tsp fine salt
• 1 tsp black pepper
• 1 lemon
• 4 large taboon breads or thin flatbreads
• 80g pine nuts
• Plain yoghurt and a tomato salad, to serve

Before you cook

• Halve the onions and slice them thinly.
• Pat the chicken pieces dry with kitchen paper.
• Mix two tablespoons of the sumac with the seven spice, allspice, cardamom, one and a half teaspoons of salt and the pepper in a small bowl.
• Heat the oven to 200C.

Steps

1. Rub the chicken pieces all over with half the spice mix and two tablespoons of the olive oil.
2. Sit the chicken in a roasting tin and squeeze over the juice of half the lemon.
3. Roast the chicken for forty minutes, until the skin is browned and the juices run clear.
4. Warm one hundred and twenty millilitres of the olive oil in a wide pan over medium-low heat.
5. Add the sliced onions and the remaining salt and stir to coat them.
6. Cook the onions gently for twenty-five to thirty minutes, stirring now and then, until they are completely soft and translucent but not browned.
7. Stir the remaining sumac and spice mix into the onions and cook for two more minutes.
8. Take the pan off the heat and taste; the onions should be sour, salty and rich all at once.
9. Toast the pine nuts in a dry pan over medium heat for three minutes until golden, shaking often.
10. Lay the flatbreads on a large baking tray, overlapping them slightly.
11. Brush the breads generously with the remaining olive oil and any juices from the chicken tin.
12. Spread the sumac onions in a thick even layer over the bread.
13. Sit the roasted chicken pieces on top of the onions.
14. Return the tray to the oven for fifteen minutes, until the bread edges crisp and the chicken skin darkens.
15. Scatter over the toasted pine nuts and squeeze over the remaining lemon half.
16. Serve straight from the tray, tearing off pieces of soaked bread with each piece of chicken.