Preparation: 15 mins | Cooking time: 35 mins

A friend invited us round for a meal a few years ago and made us this quick chicken hash. I admit, we were a little dubious at first when they described what was in it!

Our fears were unfounded, I’m happy to say. Not only is this meal delicious (if a little unusual) it’s just so quick and easy to prepare. As quick chicken recipes go, it’s unbeatable.

This serves around 4 people.

Ingredients

• 450g / 1lb diced chicken (easiest to buy it diced from your butchers)
• 1 x 225g frozen peas (add to some boiling water for a minute to thaw)
• 50g blanched almonds
• 6 black olives (stoned and finely chopped)
• 1 can of condensed cream of mushroom soup
• 1 small red pepper, diced
• Salt and pepper for seasoning

Instructions

Pre-heat the oven to 180°C or Gas Mark 4.

Mix together the chicken, peas, almonds and olives.

Heat the soup in a small pan (don’t dilute it, heat it as it is), then stir in the chicken mixture together with the red pepper.

Add salt and fresh ground black pepper to season, then pour the lot into a casserole pot. Cover the pot and cook in the oven for around 35 minutes.

We tend to simply serve this with some rice. Nice and easy as quick chicken recipes go, and absolutely delicious!

Preparation: 5 mins | Cooking time: 90 mins

Don’t be put off by the cooking time with this recipe – it takes no time at all to prepare and then it’s just left in the oven to slowly cook. 5 minutes putting it all together and then relax! This is surely what quick chicken recipes are all about.

Our daughter simply hates tomatoes, and yet she adores this dish. Quite an endorsement!

This serves around 4 people.

Ingredients

• 4 jointed chicken legs
• Olive oil
• 1 fresh red chilli (finely chopped)
• 4 or 5 cloves of garlic (don’t take the skins off, leave them whole)
• Handful of fresh basil (dried will also do)
• 2 or 3 handfuls of cherry tomatoes, or a mixture of ripe red tomatoes and cherrys
• 1 tin of white beans (butter, cannellini, etc)
• Handful of potatoes (new potatoes tend to work best)

Instructions

Pre-heat the oven to 180°C or Gas Mark 4.

Generously season the chicken legs, rubbing the salt and pepper into the skins with your fingers. They’ll taste fabulous!

Put the chicken legs in a small roasting pan or casserole dish. Then throw in the basil, the tomatoes, the garlic cloves and the chopped red chili. Don’t worry, the chili just adds a little heat, it won’t taste spicy.

Pour over a little olive oil and toss the ingredients together to coat with the oil and to mix it all up a bit. This should have taken you less than 5 minutes at this point – bonus!

Now pop the lot in the oven and simply leave for around 90 minutes. Resist the temptation to keep opening the door and poking it – you want everything to slowly bake together so the flavors develop and melt together. Yum.

After half an hour we throw in the beans and potatoes. This just bulks the dish out so we don’t have to bother making any separate accompaniments.

Then simply serve. You can squash the garlic out of the skins before you serve if you like, or leave them as they are if there are any vampires in your midst!

Absolutely lip-smackingly delicious, and one of the quickest quick chicken recipes I know.