Rosey Harissa Chicken With Greek Lemon Potatoes

The holidays don’t usually end with a bang. They taper off. The tree comes down, the bits of tinsel or garland find their way into unexpected corners, and the calendar quietly insists on January.

After weeks of cooking for crowds and cooking to impress, I find myself wanting food that feels personal again. Something made just for whoever happens to be at the table, even if it’s just Newt and I tonight. Something with a story.

This year, that story came from my stocking.

My kids tucked a small jar of Rosey Harissa inside, the kind of gift that tells you they pay attention. Harissa is one of those ingredients that carries warmth rather than heat, spice with intention. But I’ve never had the rosey variety. There’s a lightness to it. It feels right for this in-between moment, when winter is still very much here but the excess of the holidays has passed.

So I cooked with it on a quiet night, when the house was calm and the fridge looked a little bare. I served some Greek lemon potatoes alongside it. It wasn’t a holiday meal. It wasn’t trying to be.

INGREDIENTS

2 pounds chicken thighs - I used boneless skinless, cut in half

juice from 1 lemon

2-3 tbsp olive oil

1 tbsp kosher salt

3 tbsp rosey harissa

3 tbsp honey

1/3 cup chicken stock

METHOD

Mix juice from 1 lemon and an equal amount of olive oil. Brush the mixture on both sides of the chicken.

Sprinkle salt on both sides of the chicken. In a skillet over medium heat, brown the pieces of chicken on both sides. (You could bake them for half an hour or so but I cut them in half and did them on top of the stove.) Mix the harissa and honey with the stock and add to the pan. Cook for 10-15 minutes on each side, depending on the size of the thighs.

INGREDIENTS

2.5 pounds potatoes

1 1/2 cups chicken stock/broth

1/2 cup olive oil

1/3 cup lemon juice

5 garlic cloves, finely grated using microplane

1 tbsp dried oregano

2 tsp salt

METHOD

Preheat oven to 400.

Peel potatoes and cut large ones into thick wedges.

Place potatoes in a roasting pan with all the other ingredients. Toss well.

Roast for 20 minutes. Turn potatoes, roast for a further 25 to 30 minutes until the liquid is mostly absorbed by potatoes/evaporated and you’re left with mainly oil in the pan.

To blister them a bit (which I like), tilt the original roasting pan and scoop off as much of the oil as you can (some juice is ok), then drizzle over the potatoes.

Broil for 2 minutes or so. There’s something comforting about cooking with a gift from your children, especially once the decorations are boxed away and life begins to resume its normal pace.

The holidays may be over, but their echo remains in small ways. A jar in the pantry. A memory in a bite. A little warmth carried forward, one simple meal at a time.